Carnival of Rust
by Know-It-All-2009
Summary: sequel to 'She Walked Away'. Open war is upon them, with less than one year to prepare to hunt for the Horcruxes there is still a lot to learn and so much to do to be prepared for the final battle, but surviving while trying to find the Horcurxes is another battle all unto itself.
1. War is Coming

**Carnival of Rust **

Chapter One: War is Coming

* * *

Their fifth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry had finally come to an end. Hermione knew that times where changing. It had been verified that Lord Voldemort had returned and Harry had stubbornly tried to push both her and Ron away. It had taken some convincing but Hermione had managed to get Harry to agree not to leave them behind, no matter the cost.

She had been home all of one day before she slowly started to think of what all needed to be done for the upcoming war. The first was that she needed to get started on several potions which meant she had to visit an apothecary and soon. From there she knew she needed to start her own garden because it would be a lot cheaper than attempting to buy everything from the apothecary but it was a matter of how could she convince her parents to put in a greenhouse.

Shaking herself from her thoughts Hermione made her way from her room down the stairs and into her mother's kitchen where her mother sat, drinking a cup of coffee and reading the morning paper.

"Mum, I have to do a major project for Herbology and Potions to graduate that I have to start on this year but it requires me growing my own plants and the school simply doesn't have enough greenhouse space for everyone to use. Do you think if I started my own garden that if I showed you what to do with the magical plants you could take care of them for me if I start the seedlings?" Hermione asked, hoping and praying that her mother would agree.

"I'm sure I could manage but I'm sure if you ask nicely Ms. Weasley wouldn't mind coming over and taking care of the ones that I wouldn't know what to do with." Jane said, rising to fix another cup of coffee before pouring a cup for her daughter and setting it in front of her.

"Well they could do with the money and she'd be able to apparate over once a week to do a look over and pull what needs to be pulled." Hermione said, liking the idea more and more as she mulled it over. "I also have to do a major project in Potions but I don't really have the room in my bedroom to brew; it just wouldn't be safe." She said this more to herself than her mother but her mother answered her none the less.

"We have that spare bedroom that's next to your office. We could turn that into a brewing room if you like." She said smiling at how diligent her daughter was over her school work. "It's not like we have company over that often and I wouldn't want you to give up your office just so you have room to brew."

"That sounds wonderful. If you don't mind can I floo to the Leaky Cauldron? I need to get supplies to get stated on my projects so I don't have to wait to long." She asked, knowing her mother wouldn't tell her only child no.

"That sounds fine. Do you have any specifications on the greenhouse and brewing room for your end-of-year projects? I can get someone out here today to get started on putting the greenhouse up but if you need anything for your brewing room I need to know now so I know who I need to bring in." her mother said, pulling a notebook and a pen from the side of the table to in front of her.

"I'll at least need a cupboard or two for my brewing room if not shelves. I'll also need a workspace to prepare ingredients I'm working on a Mastery in both Herbology and Potions so the larger the cupboard the better actually and as far as the greenhouses go several cupboards should suffice as long as I have one for the pots, fertilizer and soil, and the seeds themselves." Hermione said, throwing that out there so she'd have enough room for as many ingredients as she could get her hands on. "I'll have to stock my cupboards from scratch as well as getting the books from my Book Lists. It doesn't bother you that I want to do two masteries; it will be rather expensive and today will be the first trip of many." Hermione said, hoping to prepare her mother for just how much money she had planned on spending.

"We'll manage. If you don't mind let me run to the bank first before you go and then you'll be set." Her mother said, heading towards the foyer with a promise to return shortly.

When her mother returned she handed Hermione a rather thick envelope smiling at her like a Cheshire cat.

"Don't complain about the amount. I'm sure you did wonderful on your OWLs and you are top of your year every year. You have more than earned this." She said, watching as her daughter pulled the pounds out of the envelope and start counting.

"Mum! That's five thousand pounds! I can't take this." She said, as her mind started running a mental conversion. If her math was right that was $8, 421.50 US Dollars and 1,000 Galleons.

"Take it Hermione. A Mastery isn't going to come cheap. You'll probably go through a thousand pounds just today getting cauldron's, potions ingredients, seeds, pots, dirt and your course books. Now go, I have phone calls to make if you want your greenhouse up in time for you to be able to use it this summer." Her mother said, turning and placing her daughter in front of the fire place when she looked at her mother in shock. "Just add it to your Gringots account. We've kept up the usual transfers into the account over the years. There should be plenty more where that came from."

* * *

Coming out of the floo network always disoriented Hermione but she shook it off. She had a lot to do today and not enough time to do it in. Her first stop was Gringots so she could convert the money she had been given by her mother. A statement from her account showed that there was close to 593 Galleons, 10 Sickles, and 5 Knuts within her account. Once she transferred the money her mother had given her the total came to 1,593 Galleons, 10 Sickles, and 5 Knuts in her account.

Once her business was finished at Gringots she made her way to Flourish and Blotts knowing that the bookstore would take up most of her time. Books on Healing, Herbology and Potions where all added to her cauldron at an alarming rate. From there it was onto Charms, Transfiguration, Defense Against the Dark Arts and Defense Against Magical Creatures as well as Gardening and Herbal Gardening books.

Titles such as _Herbal Healing for the Novice, Herbology Beyond Hogwarts, Herbology Beyond Dumstrung, Herbology Beyond Beuxbanks, Herbal Healing Gardens: What to Grow With Limited Space, Mandrake or Matagorda, Wolfsbane or Aconite: A Rose By Any Other Name, _the book she really wanted was entitled _Herbology Masters Reference Manual _and knowing that her mother wouldn't begrudge her if she spent money on books it was swiftly added to the cauldron.

From there it was onto Charms textbooks that went beyond your standard Hogwarts curriculum but where listed as _ Optional Reading, _which only she and a few Ravenclaws ever really did. The entire optional reading text list was pulled, including the optional readings in comparison to the book they had to read this year entitled Quintessence: A Quest, which had to be read by Christmas. From there it was books that where related to _Quintessence: A Quest _or along the same subject matter, for which there where at least twentythat got added to her cauldron along the names of _The Elements of Ether: Unhidden _and _The Masters Guide to the Elements: A Companion to Quintessence: A Quest _and _The Workbook for Quintessence: A Quest. _From there it was time for Transfiguration and Charms two of her favorite subjects. The Year Seven and Year Six books were added to her cauldron of _The Standard Book of Spells Grade Six & Seven _before it became apparent that just those wouldn't do as she had heard rumors that the amounts of papers written in Year Six and Year Seven where astronomical so she set out to find three more Transfiguration and Charms books. The first Transfiguration book she found was entitled _Everything You Need to Know About Inanimate Transfiguration _while the second was entitled _Theories of Transsubstainal Transfiguration _and _The Young Wizard's Guide to Appartaion. _The Charms books were selected with the help of the sales witch who recommended _Charms Defensive Usage _, _The Theory of Charms Creation _and _The Magic Behind the Charms _before she moved onto the Potions section.

As she was attempting to get a potions book, _The Moste Potent Potions,_ down from the shelf she bumped into none other than Professor Dumbledore who was reaching for a book high above her head.

"Ms. Granger, I would ask what brings you here but your love of knowledge is well known." He said, giving her a smile as he glanced at the titles that were piling up in her cauldron. "Would you join me for tea? I would like to discuss some things with you." He said, taking her cauldron from her as they made their way further into the shop as he added even more titles to her shopping cauldron on topics she hadn't even considered buying. Mind-Healing, Soul Magic, and a few books she didn't catch the titles on where quickly added to the cauldron in quick succession.

When he added a few Astrology, Numerology and Arithmancy books she raised her eyebrow in question at the Astrology books but the negative shake of his head told her to hold her questions until later.

Once he paid for her books at his instance they made their way to the apothecary where he once again placed a rather large order for her, ignoring her protests that she could pay for it herself as he handed the young woman close to one hundred galleons before telling her they would be back to pick up the order within the hour, which let Hermione know that he had overpaid for the purchases intentionally.

"Now, you will need an expandable trunk, as well as a mole-skin pouch for your money. From there we'll go see Ollivander's; if he asks your old wand broke." He said, leaving no room for argument as they made their way to the trunk shop.

Once inside the trunk shop Dumbledore began talking to the owner in quick succession.

"We'll need an expandable trunk with at least three compartments and a never-ending mole skin pouch." He said, watching as the man quickly went to retrieve the trunk and pouch coming back with a trunk that was slightly larger than the Hogwarts standard issue trunk that was a dark red color with latches that would shine against the sun and a small mole skin pouch.

"This trunk is a true work of genius. It is meant for a Mastery-level apprentice. The first compartment is for books; all you have to do is point your wand, or wave your hand if you place a retrieval charm on it, and think of the subject, title, or author that you would require a book from. The second compartment is meant for your clothing, toiletries, and things of that nature. The third compartment is meant for potions ingredients, cauldrons, parchment, ink and things of that sort. All three compartments are extendable and if you find yourself needing more room and don't know the spell work behind it I can show you how to expand them when it is time." He said, as he took the money from Professor Dumbledore for their purchases before Hermione was an owner of a brand-new trunk and mole-skin pouch.

Once inside Ollivander's Hermione allowed Professor Dumbledore to do the talking before he had her trying out wands at quick succession rates. Finally they came to a 9 inch Beechwood wand with a Phoenix Feather core which worked wonderfully for her.

"Beechwood has strong ties to ancient runes as well as spells regarding information, invocation of ancient guardians and research into old writings. From what I've heard about you Miss Granger this wand is perfectly suited for you." Mr. Ollivander said, handing her the wand before passing her two wand holsters with a wink saying "As far as I know your original wand was broken," before ushering them out of the shop, waving off their attempts to pay for the wand with a broad smile.

"Mr. Ollivander, I was wondering if you had any books on wand crafting or wand lore or know where I could get some." Hermione asked, just as they were about to leave.

"You won't find any books on wand crafting in a bookstore in the United Kingdom I'm afraid. They're all Ministry regulated and wand lore isn't as popular a topic as it used to be although you may find a few books at _Tomes and Scrolls _in Hogsmeade. Give me a few minutes; I have several books that I have several versions of as well as some duplicates I can give you." He said as he started walking towards a side door. "Actually, come with me. It will go faster this way." He said after a moment's thought as the young girl followed him through a door that she had never entered in the wand maker's shop.

As it turned out that door lead to Mr. Ollivander's work space where there where countless boxes upon boxes of wood that had been carved down but yet to be turned into wands and jars upon jars of items that could be used for wand cores.

"Here is a crate. Start with the boxes of wood. I'd say take thirty of each. From there move onto the cores. Do forty of each because you'll burn up a few cores more than likely trying to create your first few wands. You can use magic on the wood but not on the cores but the cores are easier as they're in glass jars and each jar equals out to thirty pieces. The crate I gave you will shrink down with a tap of your wand and not harm the products inside." He said as he moved to the vast book collection as Hermione started packing the crate as instructed.

"It's been forever since I've taken on an apprentice. Would you be interested? I realize that you probably won't be taking over the shop with helping Harry attempt to defeat You-Know-Who but the knowledge could come in handy should you all ever need to create new wands. Your original wands are tapped to you, meaning the Ministry knows you have them. Your second wand is not registered with the Ministry but considering the trouble the three of you keep getting into it would be useful to know how to make your own." Ollivander said, talking as cheerfully as ever, as if they were not talking about what could be the end of the world.

"That sounds wonderful Mr. Ollivander. I would gladly accept." She said grinning from ear to ear as he turned to her with a smile.

"Well then, you'll need more books than I thought and you just got us around the Ministry regulation about the books on wand creation. Rumor has it that your school week is going to be pretty busy from what Professor Dumbledore has told me. We'll do Saturday's and by December if we need to we'll ramp it up and do Saturday's and half or all of Sunday if your study schedule permits." Here the old man paused to wink at Hermione, which made her think he knew something she didn't as books started flying to her at an alarming rate before they took a sharp turn and started filling themselves in the crate at her feet which kept expanding as more books where added.

"You might want to tell Harry that the Apothecary is looking for an apprentice. It'd basically be a double apprenticeship because he'd be learning potions ingredients as well as the herbology behind it all. If he wants it though, he'll need to talk to her soon but I'll talk to Miss Matthews and see if she'll hold it for him. Before you leave I'll set up a port key for you so you don't have to drive all the way in every weekend until you start school." He sat back with a sigh and admired the number of books that where in the crate.

"Now these are yours to keep no matter how this war goes down. They are a gift to you weather you finish your apprentice term or not." He said, before waving his wand over a piece of parchment which transferred the writing to another parchment which he handed to her. "This is your study schedule. Which books to read when and what papers need to be finished by what week. If Ronald is interested in an apprentice term talk to _Flourish and Blotts _and _Tomes and Scrolls _although it's a dying art it would help you get more books as your love of knowledge is well known." He said with a smile as they started to exit the shop.

Just as they passed the threshold Hermione heard the shop keeper say in a cheery tone.

"Let me know when I can expect Ron and Harry again. I'm sure we'll find them something. Such a tragedy their original wands broke. Oh, Hermione this Saturday and Sunday we'll just have lunch and probably an afternoon tea so I can get you adjusted to the shop."

Hermione laughed slightly to herself as Professor Dumbledore turned to her once again.

"Would it be alright if we apparated? It is a rather long walk and we really do need to talk." He said, taking her arm when she nodded her consent.


	2. The Summer Begins

**Carnival of Rust  
**_**The Summer Begins**_

* * *

Once inside the Headmaster's office she took a seat as a house elf poured them both a cup of tea before disappearing from sight.

"You are a very smart woman Miss Granger. You know a war is coming and you know that the three of you will be on the forefront of that war. I am glad that you are planning ahead. I would like to teach both you and Ron legilimency and occulumency this summer. I found it valuable that Harry learned it and think it will serve the two of you very well in the near future. When you return to school I will keep up your lessons but talk to your parents first and make sure it is okay if we use your house for the lessons. If not I'm sure we could use Hogwarts. I don't think it is wise to let Mrs. Weasley know what we are doing just yet. As far as your Herbology work and Potions work I would focus on figuring out just what exactly you think you'll need for the upcoming years and make as much as you possibly can. When you return to Hogwarts I'll see to it that you have your own Green House and Brewing Room. Unfortunately I do believe you are correct in that it will come down to what you are thinking but for now let's return to Diagon Alley to pick up the rest of your supplies and then I will help you set up your brewing room and greenhouse at your home and then talk to your parents." He said, as they walked towards the doors to Hogwarts from his office.

When they picked up the order from the apothecary Hermione finally got a good look at what all Professor Dumbledore had added to her list. There where Ashwinder eggs, Angels Trumpets, Acromantula Venom, several Bezoar's , Dragon's Claws, Dragon Horns, Unicorn Blood as well as several Unicorn Horns which made Hermione wonder how he managed those as they were not cheap and the Unicorn Blood was illegal to sale or own. From there it was countless muggle herbs in quantities that she had only seen inside the apothecary. When Dumbledore shrank thirteen cauldrons her eyebrows went up into her hairline but she didn't say a word until they were outside back in the alley.

"Before this war is over Hermione you'll need them. I know what you are working on. The more cauldrons you have the better. I mass ordered some more phials for you but they didn't have enough to fill the order. We have 2,000 phials but a shipment of 10,000 will arrive at your house within a few days and as far as the Unicorn Blood goes. It is only cursed if it is taken forcefully from a unicorn or from a slain unicorn. The herds in the Forbidden Forrest give unicorn blood as often as they are willing and then we have sources outside the United Kingdom that have herds that are willing to give as much as they can. Did you know a Unicorn could choose to give away all the blood in their body expect for a pint and they would still live? The sun regenerates them as does the rain and rainbows. Several unicorns during the last war would do this two or three times a week as it only takes them six hours to regenerate their blood as long as they are in constant sunlight and just so you know if the blood is freely given it's a bright red, if it's forcefully taken it's a dark, almost black , red. " He said, giving her a sad smile as they apparated back to her house.

Once back at the Granger residence Hermione was surprised to see that the green house was already in place but she had been gone for going on five hours. When her mother mentioned to Professor Dumbledore that she was converting their spare bedroom into a potions room for Hermione he offered his assistance in setting it up; saying it would go a lot quicker if he were there to help.

* * *

Within an hour the spare bedroom had been packed up and Hermione had her own private personal lab that was in-between her bedroom and her personal library and office. Professor Dumbledore once again unshrunk all her purchases before they began to file themselves in alphabetical order.

"I am impressed with the size of your library Miss Granger. You truly are an academic at heart. Now Dr. Granger I was wondering if I could impose on your house twice a week for private lessons for Hermione and two of her friends for their summer projects. I will also be stopping by with Bill Weasley tomorrow as well. We intend to erect some wards around your house so that you may practice magic over the summer and start some more advanced training. I have also taken the liberty of adding two more desks to your office which I will remove once we finishing going over your summer revision sets, as well as two more bookcases that I intend to leave for you or let Harry or Ron take home. "

With Mrs. Granger's consent he told Hermione he would be back the next day with Ron and Harry to start on their training before leaving Hermione alone with her parents.

"Your lab looks wonderful Hermione. The greenhouse finished while Professor Dumbledore was working on your office so you can get started on your seeds tomorrow as it's almost too late today." Her mother said, noticing that it was going on almost five in the evening.

"If you don't mind mum I want to get started on some research for my projects and take an inventory of what I have in my potions room. Professor Dumbledore bought most of my potions ingredients and I'm not sure what all he added to my list." She said, blushing at the admission to her mother.

"You must have made an impression on him. Go on then. When you get hungry dinner will be ready." Her mother said, laughing at her daughter's love of knowledge which she had inherited from her.

"Oh, by the way, I was accepted for an apprenticeship by the wand maker Ollivander. He hasn't taken on an apprentice in fifty years! He gave me a port key but it will keep me busy on Saturday and part of Sunday for the next year." She said, surprised to see her mother frown in her direction.

"Two masteries and an apprenticeship, love? Isn't that a little much Hermione? There are only so many hours in the day after all." She said, hoping her daughter wasn't going to work herself into burnout like she had her third year. When she had returned that summer Hermione slept for a day and a half and it took a month for the dark circles under her eyes to disappear.

Hermione laughed which cause her mother to raise an eyebrow in her direction.

"It's common in the wizarding world; although I have been informed that if my grades start to slip the apprenticeship will be placed on hold until I can pull them up. As for the time issue, there are ways around time. It's called a _time-turner _and it's how I took all eleven courses my Third Year. Professor Dumbledore said he was already working on getting me one."

"Okay that bends all kinds of Physics Laws but I guess magic just delays the laws of Physics." Her mother said with a laugh. "Do you think you could find me some books on Magic and Physics? I'm actually curious now oh and time-turners as well." She asked, hoping such things existed.

"I have an order form for both of the bookstores in the U.K. if you'll give me a moment I'll go get it and we can look it over together, you have me curious now." She said, and with her mother's approval ran up the stairs at a break-neck speed before coming back with two massive order forms.

Taking her wand from its holster she tapped it against the order form while thinking of the random subjects of magic and physics on both sheets before she handed one to her mother and kept one for herself. She was surprised to see that there were quite a few books on the topic including one labeled _Science and the Akasha Field _which was immediately added to the check-out sheet before she refined her search to the term _Akasha _and came up with hundreds of books. Quickly skimming the books she found five that interested her which where swiftly added to the check-out sheet before she turned to her mother.

"I've found six so far that would be of interest. What about you?" she asked, glad to see her mother smiling.

"I've found nine. If I gave you British pounds would they be able to exchange it for Galleons?" she asked, not really understanding how the wizarding world banking system worked.

"No but if you like I'll pay for it and you can reimburse me in pounds. I tend to keep muggle currency and wizarding currency on me at all times." Hermione said, which made her mother proud that she was attempting to keep her feet in both worlds, even if she was slipping away into the wizarding world more each day.

"That sounds fine. What's the total then?" her mother asked, having never figured out the conversion rate from pounds to galleons.

"250 pounds or 50 Galleons." Hermione, said automatically converting it into both muggle and magical currency.

"Sounds reasonable considering the number of books we're getting. Be sure to order double so you'll have copies of the books yourself." Her mother said, smiling when her daughter nodded before handing over the required money as her daughter slipped it into her mole skin pouch before placing her hand over it and saying: "55 Galleons" which earned her an eyebrow raise from her mother.

"Owl-order charge." She said off-handily as she placed the appropriate amounts of money with each envelope before sealing them and tapping them with her wand which caused both to disappear which shocked her mother.

"They returned to the store. We'll have our order within thirty minutes to an hour. Will you let me know when they arrive? I want to get started on inventorying my potions room and it will take me forever at this rate to get it done as I have to weigh everything." Hermione said, surprised when her mother spoke up again.

"I have a kitchen scale if you'd like some help. Two people will get the job done twice as fast." Mrs. Granger said, noticing the worried look on her daughters face.

"Are you sure mum? We use some really weird stuff in potions, rat brains, bats blood, toad eyeballs things of that sort." She said, hoping to scare her mother off before she freaked herself out with a simple offer to help her daughter catalogue her potions room.

"Hermione, I made it through medical school, cadavers, gross anatomy, and histology. A few animal parts that I've more than likely dissected during my undergraduate and medical school career will not bother me."

"Well then the offer sounds wonderful. If you'll grab your scale and meet me in the potions room I need to grab a pair of dragon hide gloves for both of us from my trunk." She said, noticing the odd look she received once again. "You'll understand when you see them." She said with a laugh, remembering the web-like sleeve that the gloves all came with.


	3. Telling the Truth

**Carnival of Rust**

_03. Telling the Truth_

* * *

Authoress Note: The book Science and the Akasha Field is a real book. Science heavy, but a very good read.

* * *

Entering the potions room Hermione noticed her mother looking around in awe. It was the first time she had been inside the room since it had been converted for brewing and it did look mighty impressive to someone who hadn't spent the past five years of their life brewing potions two to three times a week.

"It's divided by section. Herbs, Animal Parts, Liquids etc. Why don't you start with the herbs but everything that was ordered today will need to be added before you start weighing. In fact let's just go through those boxes on the wall first, get everything put up where it needs to go and then start weighing." She said as she pulled out all the boxes that contained animal parts and the more dangerous liquids before leaving her mother to sort through the herbs and non-toxic or corrosive liquids, even with the dragon hide gloves on.

They had brought in a radio that was placed up on the brewing table which allowed them to work away the hours as they alternatively listened to the radio and talked about several of the potions ingredients that they were currently stocking.

"You know Hermione. I'm far from stupid." Her mother said suddenly, which confused Hermione.

"What are you talking about I'm confused." Hermione said, stopping what she was shelving to turn and face her mother.

"Let's get a pot a tea and coffee started this is going to take a while." Her mother said as she started out of the room and down the stairs before coming into her kitchen and starting both a pot of tea and coffee.

No one spoke until the drinks where finished and they were situated around the kitchen table Mrs. Granger started up again.

"I know something is happening. I do believe that you're taking on the apprenticeship but I don't believe that you are working on both a Potions and Herbology Mastery but you're doing all this work for a reason. You never do anything half way. People have started dying with no obvious reason why; they keep labeling it as congestive heart failure but we're talking entire families here, old and young. It's only going around in the medical community right now the media has been put under a hush order but I'm starting to recognize some of the names as people you've mentioned from Hogwarts. Your _Headmaster _of all people asks if he can give you, Ron, and Harry private lessons? No headmaster takes that much of a vested interest in students unless there is something to gain from it. I need you to be straight with me Hermione. You're stubborn just like me and I won't try and stop you from doing whatever it is you need to do but I just want to know the truth." She said, noticing the way her daughter's eyes fell to the table

"Telling you is dangerous but you have a right to know. Before Harry, Ron and I were born there was a Wizarding World War going on. Someone by the name of Tom Marvalo Riddle believed in blood purity; that only those of magical blood where worthy of the power that came with being a witch or a wizard. Someone born of non-magical parents are known as muggle-born but their parents are known as a muggle, or non-magical folks, I'm sure you've heard me use the term, but there was another name for them that Riddle and his followers, later called Death Eaters used. Mud-Blood or Dirty Blood, the Death Eaters and their leader wanted to purify the Wizarding World, much like Hitler did with the Jews. A group called the Order of the Phoenix headed by Professor Dumbledore fought them at every turn. Harry's parents, James and Lily Potter, where members as where Ron's parents, Arthur and Molly Weasley, although Molly didn't fight in the war as she was pregnant will her first child at the time, Bill. The war was brutal with many deaths on both sides when a prophecy was given by a seer. Now usually, I don't put much stock in Divination, but this one turned out to come true. It was what is called _The First Wizarding War_, because, unfortunately we are headed for a second one. The early remnants began in the 1940s but 'officially' began in 1970. The prophecy read "_The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches... born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies... and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not... and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survive..._" at the time there were two candidates for the prophecy and both children's parents where members of the Order of the Phoenix. From there I'm sure you can guess who was chosen. You've seen his scar. On Halloween night 1981 Lord Voldemort got the information for the _Fidelius Charm_, which is a charm that can hide house, people and their houses for example and only the Secret Keeper can let people know the secret, from their Secret Keeper who was a closet Death Eater." Here Hermione paused to take a sip of her tea as her hands started to shake. "James Potter died first trying to defend his wife and child. Lilly had run up to the nursery to protect Harry and when she refused to step aside he killed her. In killing Lilly Potter with her son in her arms, Voldemort enacted an ancient magic that he hadn't calculated into his plans. A mother's love is the strongest thing in this world. Her willing sacrifice protected Harry from the Killing Curse, which rebounded and , so we thought, killed the man who had killed thousands in the name of blood purity."

"Fast forward eleven years to our first year at Hogwarts. Harry's Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon are considered, in my opinion, the worst sort of muggles, no humans, imaginable. Until Harry returned from his first year at Hogwarts he was sleeping in a cupboard under the stairs, cooked for them, cleaned for them, and was given hand-me-down clothes from his whale of a cousin who was three times Harry's size, while Harry was well under the average weight for an eleven year old boy. They tried to keep him from going to Hogwarts, going as far as to go to an island in an attempt to not be found but Hagirid, the Game Keeper at Hogwarts, found him none the less two days before the train left. He didn't know he was a wizard and that he was famous, they call him _The Boy Who Lived _, because of his defeat of Lord Voldemort. The poor boy spent the entire train ride pouring over his textbooks and asking a million and one questions afraid of being behind when we got there. School started and while I had met both Ron and Harry on the train, I spent the majority of my time in the library attempting to study and get ahead which didn't gain me any friends but I have always been a swoot. Halloween roles around again, which we figure must be cursed with our luck, and a troll has somehow managed to find its way into the dungeons of the school. Ron had made fun of me earlier in the day and I had been hiding in the girl's bathroom when the troll came in. Harry and Ron had overheard someone say where I was earlier during dinner and came to look for me right as the troll found its way into the bathroom I had been hiding in. They saved my life that day and we became fast friends after that ever since. Every year has brought forth its own set of challenges. Second Year was a Basilisk which was petrifying students who saw its eyes in the reflection of something or through one of the schools ghosts for example. I wound up petrified during the Winter Term and spent the rest of the school year unable to move, although I could hear everything around me. Third year an "escaped murderer" from the wizarding prison escaped and was hanging around the school. We found out later in the year that he was innocent of turning the Potters location over to the Dark Lord and that the man who had actually been their Secret Keeper, Peter Pettigrew betrayed them before getting into a fight with Sirius Black and then cutting off his own finger and turned into an Animigus to escape and let Sirius Black take the fall. His name was never cleared but he was able to spend two years with Harry, who was his godson, even though he could never live with him. Fourth year was a fiasco. They reinstated the _Triwizard Tournament _which is a tournament that three schools compete in, Hogwarts, Dumstrung, and Beuxbanks. There are three tasks that each school's champion has to compete in but you had to been seventeen to enter in the tournament. Someone entered Harry's name in the tournament and because it was a magically binding contract once your name was placed inside the Goblet of Fire he had no choice but to compete. I spent the entire year trying to come up with ways for Harry not to get himself killed as well as the fact the school work was piled on so high that it felt like we never saw the light of day unless it was a Hogsmeade's weekend. During the last event of the tournament the port key that was supposed to return the winner to the pedestal took Cedric Diggory and Harry into a graveyard. Cedric was killed instantly but Harry was kept alive due to a potion that Tom Riddle needed some of Harry's blood for. It was to return him to physical form better than what he had. In our first year he drank from a unicorn's blood, which when forcefully taken, or if the unicorn is killed, like he did, you are cursed to live a half-life, a cursed life but he had finally returned to a physical form that could do more than just have his minions going after Harry and the Ministry was forced to accept the fact. This past year was our OWL year, which is the Ordinary Wizarding Levels, which determine what subjects we can study at the NEWT-level. Every year we have gotten a new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. The rumor behind that is that Tom Riddle cursed the position when Headmaster Dumbledore or Headmaster Dippet. Last year we had Dolores Umbridge, who was soon appointed to the position of _Hogwarts High Inquisitor _which meant she had the right to inspect all the teacher's work and critic them but she did it in the most horrible ways, she expected our Divination teacher to make a prediction on the spot, which will never work. She instilled rules which were called _Educational Decrees _against the smallest infractions and our Defense instruction was strictly theoretical, which considering it was our OWL year was useless. We started a Defense group called Dumbledore's Army or DA for short so we did the theoretical work during our regular Defense Against the Dark Arts, which was below what we learned in our First Year courses and we learned the practical portions during our DA lessons. Those lessons are why all of the DA Member more than likely has all gotten no less than an Exceeds Expectations on their Defense OWL even after we had to disband because of one of the girls giving up our meeting location to Professor Umbridge. Shortly after that we lost Harry's godfather to a spell gone wrong." Hermione said, editing the real reason Sirius was no longer with them knowing that she only needed to give enough to get her mother to understand what was happening within her world.

"You're preparing for another war because he returned his followers have returned and have started hunting non-magical folks and those that are not of full magical blood. Just by being friends with Harry, and being muggleborn, was it, makes you a target so even if I wanted you to not fight or prepare for it, the fight would come to you." Jean Granger said, summing up everything Hermione had told her in less than three sentences.

"Exactly. That is why I have the time –turner. That is why I'm working on Potions, Herbs and am taking on the apprenticeship at Ollivander's. A war is coming whether we want it or not and because of my friendship with Harry, I am Enemy Number Two because I'm the strongest witch in our year and am a muggle-born."

"Keep me informed as things progress. If there is anything I can do to help you I will in a heartbeat. I'm tempted to cancel our trip to the convention and France this summer just so I can stay and help you." Her mother said, surprisingly accepting of the fact her only child was preparing for war by the sounds of it.

"No. Professor Dumbledore will keep me busy and Ron and Harry will be arriving tomorrow as I intend to put them to work for a few hours after our lessons." She said, knowing that while Ron would complain a little in the beginning he would more than likely come to enjoy potions brewing without Professor Snape breathing down his necks.


	4. Chapter 4

**Carnival of Rust**  
Authoress Note: Thanks to angel879 for my first review. I'm actually **48 Chapters **ahead of the reader in what's been written. Because of that you'll get three chapters today to make up for the wait. The 48 is an estimate because I'm finding I don't like where my chapters broke off originally, this chapter was originally 3 different chapters but should have been one.

* * *

As it turns out Professor Dumbledore returned a lot earlier with the boys than expected arriving at ten that morning.

Once they were settled into Hermione's office on chairs that had been conjured he began explaining the need for their lessons.

"We will start off with Occulumency. The first thing you will need to do is read _The Well-Groomed Mind _and _The Well-Guarded Mind. _They explain in detail what Occulumency is and how to go about it. Work at the pace the book sets on your meditations and such but start with _The Well-Groomed Mind_ first. With that being said it is usually helpful to keep a journal while you are working on Occulumency as well as Legilimency. You will need one to record your notes and progress while working through each subject as well as a regular journal. It's best to write three pages a night. The reason for this is you must be in control of your emotions to be efficient at either practice so going back over your day is a good place to start. While you are working your way through both books it would be advisable to start working through the warding books Bill gave you Hermione as well as your summer homework. Now I trust that the three of you are trust worthy enough to keep up with your work but I must stress this. It is imperative that you learn this. There are things I must tell you about Voldemort that I have been unable to tell you because of the fact your minds are open books. Once you master Occulumency then we will start working on the big picture. I won't take up any more of your time and I will check back in with you Sunday evening to see how far you have gotten in your books. Harry, Ron you will find two trunks in Hermione's office with your initials on them. They are yours as is everything inside the trunks. The password is your middle name which you may change at any time you desire. You are to work on the meditations and then owl me once you have those down and then we'll start up with the lessons that will be more like Harry remembered. Sometime today you'll need to go to Diagon Alley so Harry and Ron can get spare wands as well. Ollivander is expecting you today or tomorrow. . From there start working on the Aromatherapy course, the syllabus is inside a binder in the box. On the Incense which I would make in larger quantities, Oils, Ointments five cups should manage to last you a while as only a small amount is used. Inks, Herb Baths, Bath Salts and Powders hold well so I'd make those in large quantities as well. " He said, unshrinking what was a small box which almost tripled in size once back to its normal size.

"There are various glass jars, jars and tins, as well as bee's wax and unscented lotion in here Coca Butter, Shea Butter and Olive Oil. From there it's fabric for sachets and three mortar and pedestals. Talc Powder, Baking Soda and Borax Powder have been included as well as thirty spray bottles. You already have the books needed so here is your syllabus for this to give you something to go on while you are waiting for your potions to finish brewing. You should be receiving a book order today as well as a rather large supply of potions ingredients that I didn't have time to hand pick out to replace what you've used already. There are also close to three hundred candles. You have red, yellow, green, dark green, blue, dark blue, light blue, royal blue, gold, pink, dark pink, light pink, rose, sliver, turquoise, magenta, orange, peach, purple, indigo, white, black, gray, and brown. Although I did include a book on Candle Magic, which is a dying art, that I thought would be of interest to you as well as the supplies to make your own candles; A double boiler, wax, things of that sort. I will return later in the evening to eat dinner with you and then we'll get started on your Legilimency coursework and I will explain why you are learning all that you are. I have also included close to a thousand herbs and a thousand essential oils. There are also empty bottles to store the oils and tinctures and such that you'll make. " and with that Professor Dumbledore left them alone to begin working on their summer work.

The trio looked at each other for a moment before they levitated the box into Hermione's potions room and store room before beginning the process of placing things where they needed to go.

"What's the point of us learning Aromatherapy?" Harry asked as he began levitating the essential oils into an empty cabinet that had appeared in the room shortly after they walked in, more than likely Professor Dumbledore's doing.

"There's no telling. Dumbledore is getting more and more cryptic as the summer goes on but I doubt he'd have us do anything without good reason but Aromatherapy is a form of healing so that could be why." Hermione said, as she looked up from the syllabus that they had been given. It turned out it was seven courses in one starting at Aromatherapy 101-103 and then Aromatherapy 201-204 but it didn't look as if they would take that long to complete along-side the potions they were working on.

"Well if that wasn't cryptic as can be I don't know what is." Harry said dryly before turning to Hermione. "Dumbledore said that you have a brewing room and a green house. Can we see?" he asked, surprised that her parents had allowed her to add both additions to the house.

"Certainly. My bedroom is through the door on the left but my potions room is this door on the right." Hermione said, guiding them through the door, smiling to herself when even Ron showed signs of jealousy.

"If you don't mind I'm on a very tight brewing schedule. It would help if I had more hands." Hermione said, hoping they would be willing to help her.

"Why are you brewing so much?' Ron asked, honestly curious.

"The war has already begun. I know whatever Dumbledore is going to tell us involves some kind of quest. He has hinted at as much; I want to be prepared for whatever it is, I have a feeling it's going to have us cut off from the rest of the world which means I have to have as much done before hand as I possibly can. Speaking of have you heard back about your apprenticeships yet?"

Hermione's logic was sound and they watched as she moved around her lab with efficiency as she started decanting the Pepper-Up potion while waiting on their answer.

"The Grand Pepper-Up and the Aging Potion are finished if you could start putting that in phials for me please." Hermione said, nodding her head at the two cauldron's that were sitting next to her as both Ron and Harry immediately started transferring the potions into the phials that where within her store cupboards.

"I got a letter back from Miss Matthews this morning. I need to stop by her shop this afternoon when I go in to get my new wand." Harry said; glad to see Hermione give him a smile and a nod of the head before she turned her attention to Ron.

"Yeah. _ Flourish and Blotts _and _Tomes and Scrolls _said they'll take me on. I'll spend Saturday at _Flourish and Blotts _and Sunday at _Tomes and Scrolls_ they said there's a lot to learn but we have come to an agreement about any books we may need to defeat Voldemort. As long as I'm putting forth my best effort, and they mean 110%, I get four free books every week and I somehow got the manager to agree to the fact that all three of our school books are free, or rather mum did." He said, laughing at the delighted look on Hermione's face at the idea of free books.

By ten thirty that morning all potions were placed in phials and then into a special cupboard that was made to hold potions Hermione went to her office and came back with two books one of which was very familiar to them before she set them down on the counter that didn't hold their cauldrons.

Pulling out a blank sheet of drawing paper that was larger than the usual notebook paper or parchment, she began drawing a model scale of her greenhouse. Next to that she placed a list of everything that had been added to it before she began planning the layout of the greenhouse to suit her specific needs. The greenhouse was originally eight feet by twenty feet. With it having been magically expanded to its max it now sat at thirty two feet by eighty feet which would suit her needs perfectly.

She knew she wanted to have a section that was strictly for herbs since they were used in potions more than people realized. From there she wanted to have a section that was for cooking herbs, as her mother had instilled a love of cooking and baking in her when she was a very young girl. After that it would come down to a section for the non-magical plants that were used within potions and herbology, or plants that where strictly muggle and then finally it would be the muggle plants that were used, or had been adopted, into the magical world as time went by and more muggleborns where integrated in as Masters of their fields.

When Hermione was finally happy with the layout for her greenhouse she turned her attention back to her boys.

"I'm going to get started on the Polyjuice Potion if you guys can finish decanting the Ailhotsy Draught and the Anti-Paralysis Potion. Be sure to label all the phials clearly; we can't afford a mix up. When you finish that can you start on making the Antidote to Veritaserum as well as a batch of Veritaserum if you would. I've been tripling the recipes which are why the cauldrons are so big." Hermione said, pointing out which where her supply cupboards before she began the preparation for making the Polyjuice Potion.

"Hermione what is Ailhotsy Draught? I haven't heard of it before." Harry asked as he started filling phials with it.

"It causes hysteria. We'll be making a lot of potions this summer. We may never need them all but if we do it's good to know we have them." Hermione said, turning her attention back to the Polyjuice Potion. "We'll have to go shopping today to get some food as well as some more seeds. While we're out in the muggle world we need to collect as many hairs as we can, write down the descriptions and names if we can get them and then place the hairs in a vial. We are the top three most wanted people by Lord Voldemort; it's always good to have an escape plan. While we're there we need to order several trees from a greenery and have them delivered today." She said when they looked at her curiously.

There really was no arguing with her on that point as they turned their attention back to the Veritaserum they were making. Once the potions got to a point a _Statis Charm _could be placed on them.

"It's only eleven ten. I say let's go to a greenhouse and then go food shopping. When we're done we all need to look at what needs to be done for our Apprenticeships since we start tomorrow." Hermione said, reminding both Harry and Ron that today was Friday.

* * *

It had been decided to go into London since they would have the best stock when it came to plants as well as fertilizer and planting pots. Upon asking Mrs. Granger for a ride she heartedly agreed and within ten minutes they were on their way. Once in London Mrs. Granger dropped them off and told them that once they were finished they were to meet her at a coffee shop that was across the street from the green house which they all agreed to. Once her mother left, Hermione immediately took them to a greenery that she and her mother usually visited and when a nice young sales woman came up to her she began talking.

"I'll need Apple, Ash, Beech, Birch, Elder, Eucalyptus (Eucalyptus regnans), Laurel and Bay , Magnolia, Mimosa, Oak, Peach, Pine, Poplar, Walnut, White Willow, and Wild Cherry as well as a red rose bush, a white rose bush, and a pink rose well as any other trees that have healing properties and can be used for medicinal usages as well as several herbs." Hermione said pausing for a breath as she continued "Allspice, Burdock, Chamomile, Chestnut, Chrysanthemum, Cinnamon, Clove..." the list went on as she listed off the herbs, vegetables and fruits in rapid succession, noticing the young woman's eyes light up at the idea of such a large sale. "We would prefer the dwarf versions that can grow in pots, if you have them for the trees as well as for the rose bushes."

"If you're looking for trees with medicinal usages you might want to look into Moringa oleifera, the Banana Tree, Joshua Tree, Tea Tree, Palo Santo, the version of Tilia called _Tilia Cordata _ and an Alder tree. You might also want to look into getting a distiller and making your own essential oils if you are interested in holistic healing. It's rather expensive and it takes a lot of leaves to make the oil but if it's something that interests you then I think you would find the experience fun." She said, as she started writing out the young girls' order.

"Ok we'll take what I told you and then everything you listed. Where would I happen to find a distiller by chance?" Hermione asked, knowing it probably wouldn't be an easy task.

"There's a health food store across the street. They usually run anywhere from $200-$500 or 119 British Pounds to 297 British pounds. You could make one for seventeen British pounds but it takes forever to make one and then you're not guaranteed it could work." The lady said, as she gave Hermione the shocking total. When the young girl didn't even blink before handing over several large pound notes she just raised her eyebrow before giving her back her change. When asked for a delivery address Hermione rattled off her address and was pleased to find out that the order would be at her house within two hours; which only gave them an extra hour to get the distiller and the essential oils.

The shop the young lady had been talking about was called _Holistic Health Care _and was a rather large store that Hermione decided the most prudent way to handle the matter was to find a salesperson and ask about the distiller. It seemed their age was working against them for once as the person that directed them towards the distiller off-handedly threw out there as they were walking away that they ran anywhere from 119 Pounds to 297 British Pounds but they just waved her off as they finally located the distiller, quickly purchasing it and asking to have it delivered before quickly leaving the store, and the cranky salesperson, behind. Walking back towards the coffee shop where her mother was waiting, Hermione spotted a store that was called _The Magic Cauldron_ that they decided to step into. It turned out to be a pagan store which suited them just fine. Hermione quickly found several books on essential oils entitled _Magical Aromatherapy, The Complete Book of Incenses, Oils, and Brews_ both by someone named Scott Cunningham from there she found three more books _Magical Oils by Moonlight _by Maya Heath, _The Enchanted Formulary _by Lady Rhea and Eve LaFay and _500 Formularies for Aromathearpy _by Carol and David Shiller. From there Hermione added two of every essential oil they had in stock to their shopping bag. Noticing the gemstones Hermione quickly found three books on gemstones as well as purchasing several clear quartz gemstones and then three of every gemstone they had which made the shop owner quite happy. When they found the herbal section she gathered six ounces of everything in stock which at three hundred herbs took all of them to do. From there it was on to gathering various jars to store things in. There where jars that weren't much bigger than their potions phials and then there where jars as big as the ones used to store the herbs for sale within the store, Hermione was left in charge of selecting the jars and because she truly didn't know how many they would need she picked twenty of the smaller jars, forty of the medium sized jars and three hundred of the jars the store used to store their herbs in, allowing them to leave the store with enough jars to hold the herbs they had purchased. From there it was onto dropper bottles for their aromatherapy project. Once again not able to make up her mind Hermione added several ¼ dram, 5/8 dram, 1/6 dram, and one dram vials into the shopping bag before moving onto 2 ounce amber colored spray bottles as well as 2 ounce amber bottles. From there it was onto two and four ounce bottles with lids. On a whim she added many 8 ounce, 16 ounce and 32 ounce bottles to their purchase as well, knowing that for certain products that they thought would be really helpful, they would make a lot of now so as to not have to make it at a later date. Plastic slave containers where next on the list, which came in ¼ an ounce, 1 ounce, 2 ounces, and 4 ounces. Once several 16 ounce clear plastic jars where added to the shopping bag as well as ten acrylic lotion pump bottles at Harry's insistence they finally made their way to the check-out counter. Hermione and Harry argued over who was allowed to pay for the purchases and Harry eventually won out because he had yet to buy anything that summer while Hermione had been spending money left and right at an alarming rate.

Knowing that they only had an hour and a half left before deliveries started showing up at the Granger house they had to come up with a solid plan and quickly.

"I already have my spare wand and my contract for my apprenticeship so why don't the two of you go to Diagon Alley to solidify your apprenticeships and to get your spare wands as well as any books you need for your apprenticeships. I'll meet you back at my parents' house when you're finished I need to get home to accept the orders we've placed as well as start placing things where they go. We're not that far from _The Leaky Cauldron _if you want we can go there so we don't have to waste money buying floo powder. I'll floo home and the two of you can go on to _Flourish and Blotts _and _The Apothecary. _Ron don't forget that you'll probably have to go to _Tomes and Scrolls _in Hogsmeade today as well, Harry be sure to go with him, it is best not to be alone anymore since something is brewing in the shadows." Hermione said before exiting the store at Harry's insistence so she didn't see the total.

* * *

After Hermione returned back to her mother, both Harry and Ron started making their way into the alley with a nod towards Tom, who opted to not draw attention to the fact that Harry was on his way to the alley. Harry immediately made his way to the Apothecary where Miss Matthews was waiting for him with a giant smile.

"Mr. Potter, I was wondering when you would be coming by." She said, as she turned enough that Harry finally got a good look at her. She looked to be about twenty-eight and was built remarkably like Hermione of all people, which made Harry wonder when he had even noticed Hermione's body frame and shape but shook the thought from his head as Miss Matthews turned the sign to '_Closed for Lunch' _before motioning Harry to her office and then offering him a chair.

"I've heard conflicting reports about you Mr. Potter. I've had people tell me you're an exceptional brewer an then I've have Professor Snape say that you cheat of Hermione's cauldron and it's the only reason you've passed your Potions classes so far which makes Snape seem dumber than I originally thought as your grade isn't just based on your ability to brew, it's based on your ability to work as a team to brew something and if you got stuck with someone that he despised stronger than your grade would suffer harshly. Ollivander mentioned that you have been brewing some since you've gotten out of school. Bring me a vial of everything you have personally brewed since school has gotten out as well as your last six papers from your potions class last year, I want to see how bad of a bias Professor Snape has against you. There is a rather large box behind you that once tapped will expand to three times that size. Inside are cauldrons, unusual potion supplies, regular potions supplies, close to 50,000 phials and your study books. There is a typed curriculum for you that will tell you where to start reading and what papers I expect written and by when. As your progress in your apprenticeship you will receive other boxes. Next to that box is yet another box that holds seeds, planting soil, regular fertilizer, dragon's dung fertilizer, plant food as well as your study books and another typed curriculum for you to follow. Your job between now and Saturday is to read through the typed curriculum's for both Herbology and Potions and tell me if there is anything you do not understand. If you are feeling adventurous see if you can get your first two papers done for Potions and Herbology but they are by no means due this Saturday. Any questions so far?" she asked, noticing that Harry looked a little pale at the mention of all the supplies he had been given.

"Just verification, you want copies of all potions I've brewed over the summer and then the first two papers for Herbology and Potions if they are ready?" he asked, glad to see when she nodded her head in agreement.

"I also want to see a typed list of all the Herbology and Potions books you have in your collection or have access to." She added, almost off-handedly as if she had forgotten about it.

"I'm staying with two friends this summer, if I have access to their books am I allowed to list them?" he asked, wanting to make sure he and Miss Matthews where on the same page.

"You may but do those on a separate sheet. Title the first one _Personal Library _and the second one _Have Access To_ or something to that degree; just make sure I can tell the lists apart. Now if that is all I will see you at six tomorrow morning, you probably won't be here all day tomorrow it just depends. "

The mention of six am had Harry turning a little green but he knew better than to say anything about her request to meet that early before he shrank the boxes that he had been told to take and then exited the shop to find Ron standing their waiting for him.

"How did your first meeting go?" he asked as Ron guided them back to the Leakey Cauldron.

"It went well. I have a few books to read but if I blow this mum will kill me. I hadn't planned on accepting the offer but I made the mistake of telling Ginny who told mum. Mum got so excite that I knew I couldn't turn this down. I don't have to go to _Tomes and Scrolls _though; apparently the same person that owns _Flourish and Blott's _owns _Tomes and Scrolls _as well." Ron replied as they entered the Leakey Cauldron.

"Well that's good. You want to grab a few bottles of butter beer while where here? It'd be a good treat for Hermione." Harry said, and with Ron's agreeing nod they purchased a case, which consisted of twelve bottles, before taking the floo network to get back to Hermione's home.


	5. Chapter 5

Once they had all convened back at the Granger residence around one in the afternoon they found a regular barn owl waiting for them from Professor Dumbledore.

_Hermione, Harry and Ron,_

_I have taken the liberty of transferring some money into all of your accounts to help with your purchases in the magical and muggle worlds. I have set up an account for Ron and the documents have been included in this letter for him to sign and return to Gringots. I have also taken the liberty of placing several orders at bookstores outside of the United Kingdom which should be arriving momentarily Egypt and China are stricter on buyer confidentially. You will be receiving 240 in total which are to be read at a rate of ten a month for the next year. It's best if you learn these by heart and the amount may increase as need displays._

_I understand this is a lot to take in but everything that is being done is being done for a reason and the sooner you master Occulumency the sooner I can tell you. The quickest I've seen anyone master it was two weeks; I challenge you to do it in a week and a half to a week. It will take a lot of time but do not fall behind on your brewing._

_Professor Slughorn will be teaching potions this coming year and he has sent over a copious amount of notes for you to look over and to start brewing on._

_Because of the projects you are working on in Herbology and Potions as long as the three of you do an equal share you will be excused from your Herbology and Potions classes this upcoming year as long as you can prove you have mastered, or are working on, everything in the syllabus which have been included for your convince._

_You will have to owl Professor Slughorn with a finished vial of all potions that will be covered in class if you manage to brew all of Sixth and Seventh Year potions over the summer you may sit your NEWT in early or late August. If that is the case you will have private Potions Sessions with Professor Slughorn for the year and just a side note there is a way to tell who brewed what potion so be forewarned. Professor Sprout will check in on your greenhouse, which we will set up at Hogwarts at the start of the year, to make sure you are on track. Of course you may start on all of this over the summer if you desire and send them everything as it finishes. The same offer applies to Herbology as does Potions. If you finish all your Year Six and Year Seven plants and papers you may sit your NEWT at the Ministry of Magic when you complete it. You will be receiving owl's from them shortly._

_Should you fall to far behind you will be required to rejoin the class but this would interfere with your private lessons which will take the spot of your Herbology and Potions time slots. _

_Sincerely,_

_Albus Dumbledore _

_PS. The owl is yours to keep. I didn't name her as I figured that would be a task for the three of you. Hedwig is too noticeable to use in these times. It would be best to send her to the Burrow and allow Ms. Weasley to watch over her. Your OWL results will be arriving later today. I had them put a rush on all of your results. _

"We haven't even gotten our OWL results yet." Hermione said, making her wonder if they would be arriving before dinner. "It doesn't matter. We have brewing to do. Decant the Veritiserum and the Antidote be sure to put dates on them as well as what they are. We've tripled the recipe so you should have close to one hundred phials per potion. I'm waiting on an owl order of ten thousand phials but I have a feeling we may need more than that." Hermione said, more to herself than the boys as they started putting the Veritaserum as well as its antidote into phials as Hermione started looking through the notes Professor Slughorn had sent on what they would be covering in their Year Six Potions course.

"I'm going to get started on both the Antidote to Common Poisons and the Antidote to Uncommon Poisons. When you finish with the Veritaserum start working on the Babbling Beverage, and the Baneberry Potion be careful with the Baneberry Potion though it's a poison. We only have 2,000 phials and each potion usually takes one hundred phials so that gives us enough for ten more potions, if we get one hundred phials per potion, but like I said a larger order should be arriving momentarily tonight."

Ron blanched at the thought of them using ten thousand phials but in reality it only equaled out to one hundred potions and he had a feeling by the time they finished all the brewing Hermione wanted to do they would eventually need more than that.

"Actually Hermione, do you mind if I brew the potions? I need to take samples of my work in to show Miss Matthews tomorrow morning. I'll probably have to use the time-turner to get enough done for her and any suggestions are welcome on what to brew." He said, noticing the way Hermione's eyes lit up.

"Do the Babbling Beverage, the Baneberry Potion, Veritiserum, the antidote to Veritiserum, Blood-Replenishing Potion, the Blemish Blitzer, the Burn Healing Paste, Burning Bitter Root Balm, Pepper-Up Potion, the Calming Draught and the Cough-Curing Potion. It's eleven potions but it shows diversity." She said, glad to see that he was writing down the list as she spoke.

"Check my office there are several potions books in there." Hermione said off-handedly as she lost herself in thought. "If you're going to be working on that, then I want to get started on my work that I have to turn in tomorrow as well, Ron you might as well do the same. Just don't forget to keep an eye on the potions already brewing Harry, if you want I can go over my work in here with you and take care of those since you're working on so many potions." Hermione offered, hoping he would take her up on it.

"That actually sounds wonderful if you don't mind." He said, finally pulling the box that was shrunken from his pocket before making his way to his new trunk that was situated in Hermione's office.

Tapping the box with his wand it tripled in size at a speed faster than the human eye could see and began unpacking the rather large box into his trunk, leaving out the potions ingredients, cauldrons and vials to place into Hermione's potions room and putting away the potions and herbology books as well as all of his Herbology supplies for a later date.

Entering the potions room once again he found himself in a conundrum. There wasn't an empty shelf to put all of his potions supplies on anywhere and it was best not to mix his supplies in with Hermione's least they get them mixed up.

"Hermione, any idea where I can put all of this?" he asked, pointing to the supplies he was currently levitating in front of him.

"Hold on." She said as she walked over to her supply cabinet before opening it and pulling out what looked like a toy cabinet that was a bright red, before setting it down in the free space next to her cabinet and tapping it with her wand before it came back to its original size.

"I have a few more if you need them." She said, before going back to the notes that she had been reading on the history of wand crafting.

"Thanks. I may have to take you up on that. I'm not sure yet." He said, shrugging as, with a wave of his wand, the supplies started making their way into their assigned spots by alphabetical order which surprised Harry, he had been thinking it _would _be nice if they could alphabetize themselves and apparently his magic had picked up on that.

Filing the information away for a later date he turned his attention to making the list of books that Miss Matthews wanted him to bring in the next day.

"Hermione you keep all your books in your office right? Miss Matthews wants me to make a list of all the potions and herbology books I own and then another of all the ones I have access to." He said, catching the slight glare he got from Hermione for interrupting her reading process.

"Yes. They're categorized by subject and then by author." She said, effectively dismissing him with another glare as he took the hint and entered her office which just screamed Hermione. There where floor to ceiling bookcases that where covered in books that ranged in topic from history, magical subjects, classics, and her old school books from the private school she had attended before Hogwarts.

Finding the magic section and then again finding the potions section he quickly wrote down the title for all eighteen books that where there before going up to the find the herbology section and writing down the twelve book titles that where there, most of which were not school textbooks. From there Harry turned his attention towards the books he had gotten from Miss Matthews. There where thirty four in all but only seventeen applied to potions as the rest where Herbology books. Moving on to the ones he had purchased while in Diagon Alley he brought his grand total up to thirty five Potions texts and he had a feeling that his potions and herbology sections would grow much larger within the next year to come.

Once the same was done for his Herbology section he finally pulled out his curriculum that he had set to the side when he was unpacking the box that Miss Matthews had sent home with him before thumbing through each, taking time to look at each page. It was a lot of material there was no doubt about it but that was where the time-turner came in, as long as he had a Pepper-Up potion and managed to get at least five hours sleep a night he would be ok. The first paper for the Potions side of his mastery was half opinion and half research which made it a tricky paper as there wasn't enough information to know exactly what was wanted out of the paper. _How do Potions relate to everyone's daily lives and what is the point of studying them at Hogwarts? _With that question alone he could tell that this packet, at least, had been tailored specifically for him, which surprisingly, made him happy. He now understood why she challenged him to get the first two papers done in both Herbology and Potions, if the first potions essay was the same.

Deciding on getting his potions started since none of them had a rest time he set aside the curriculum before turning his attention to the actual brewing of potions.

The next two hours where spent chopping and dicing and stirring cauldrons left and right and when he was through he was thoroughly exhausted but he felt good. Not only had he managed to brew several potions at once, it would also help supply Hermione's potion cabinet where they stocked everything that they had already brewed which would help them all in the end.

"Mione, when I finish my papers do you think you could look them over for me?" Harry asked, knowing that she would as long as he put forth a valiant effort on his work.

"Certainly, why don't you start the Beautification Potion, the Befuddlement Draught as well as the Black Fire Potion before you start working on your essays? All you have to do is add the ingredients and let it simmer for two hours so about the time you finish up your first paper's rough draft all your potions will be done. If you like I can look up other potions that have a two hour cooking time that way you can do some more while you work on your Herbology paper." Hermione said, already going to find a potion's book that she was sure she had somewhere in her office.

"That sounds great. " was his reply, as he wanted to have as many potions as possibly to show Miss Matthews come six the next morning but there was a limit on how many she was expecting and thirteen was a lot for a Sixth Year Hogwarts Student. Once the potions where set to a _statis charm _an hour later both their plant order and their order from _The Magical Cauldron_ had arrived. Hermione set Ron to start working on unpacking the thirteen boxes from _The Magical Cauldron _while she enlisted Harry's help in the greenhouse. When she told them they could use magic as long as they didn't go past the old oak tree in her back yard she watched with a self-satisfied grin as their mood lightened considerably.

It still took them nearly an hour to transfer everything into the greenhouse and for Ron to unpack, sort, and label everything from _The Magical Cauldron _before Hermione remembered they hadn't gone shopping for food yet. Deciding to just take Ron with her as Harry's potions would be finished before they returned they made their way out of the Granger household leaving Harry to work on his potions alone.

Ten minutes into walking to the grocery store told her that taking Ron food shopping with her had been a major mistake as he had never been in a muggle grocery store before as most wizards had their own gardens and animals to get their meals from.

It felt like she had taken a child to a candy store; thirty minutes after leaving the house they returned with enough groceries to last them the month thanks to her mother leaving a nice, heavy grocery budget for them, before Hermione found a book on household charms to figure how to go about using magic to place the groceries away as well as cook dinner; she made a side note to talk to Mrs. Weasley. She highly doubted Ron had learned these sorts of things yet as he wasn't of age just quite yet.


	6. Chapter 6

After lunch Harry began the process of starting on Pepper-Up potion as well as Grand Pepper-Up Potion. The more they got done for their OWL Potions class now, the less they had to do during the school year.

"Do you want me to keep tripling the potions?" Harry asked as he turned from the ingredient preparation he was working on.

"Might as well. It's doubtful we'll ever need most of them but it's better to be safe than sorry." She said as she turned her attention back to the paper she had been working on.

Once the potions where at a point they could be left alone Harry returned to his essays, taking another thirty minutes to add the finishing touches to them before handing them over to Hermione for inspection before he looked up the next papers that had to be written for Potions and Herbology which where once again identical but trickery than the first.

_Write a paper on Potions within mythology. Write a paper on Herbology within mythology._

Having learned it was best to leave Hermione alone when she was reading, he waited patiently for her to finish as he started another round of Pepper-Up and Grand Pepper-Up potion since they only took an hour to finish.

When she finally set down her pencil from marking his paper he turned to her to ask his question.

"She wants me to write a paper on potions and herbology within mythology but I have no idea where to start." He said, a glance at the clock told him it was too late to order books from _Flourish and Blotts _.

"I have some mythology books in my library but not many. You may have to use your time-turner and go back a few hours to get the books if I don't have what you need. All my mythology books are grouped together under '_M'_ if you want to take a look. If you'll bring a few out here I'll help you as it will take forever with just you reading." Hermione said before turning her attention to Ron, who was currently nose deep in a book in Hermione's library.

"How are you coming along?" she asked, as she entered the library in front of Harry.

"I've about to finish my reading, it wasn't that much. Tomorrow is basically just an orientation of sorts for me anyway. I just had to read a 38 page introduction to the art of book binding for tonight." He said, pausing to turn a page. "I'm on page thirty seven so I say I'm doing pretty well." Ron said, pleased that he had read thirty eight pages in two hours, which for him was an astronomical rate.

"You are. The more you read the faster your reading speed will get and the better your comprehension and retention will be." Hermione said, throwing that tidbit of information to him before making her way over to the mythology section of her library, which wasn't the largest.

After an hour of searching to no avail it was given up as a lost cause as Harry found his winter cloak before re-entering the brewing room.

"Hermione, can you decant the potions when they finish please. I'm going to go to _Diagon Alley _and use my time-turner to go back thirty minutes or an hour or so I can see if I can find anything within their shelves to help me write this paper." He said and when his female best friend nodded her approval, he made his way to the floo network before disappearing from sight, and the house, for a few hours.

Hermione set a timer on her wand before turning back to the cursory text she was reading through, looking back up five minutes later to see Harry standing there with a giant grin on his face. It had been so long since she had used a time-turner she had forgotten the principle fact that they returned you at the same time you originally used the time-turner.

"How'd the book hunt go?" she asked as she turned her attention from the book she had been cursorily reading to Harry.

"It went really well. I did have to slip into muggle London to pick up a few books as a few Shakespeare texts mention Herbology and Potions and I figured I should have my own copies of them anyway. I just went ahead and purchased the complete works since it was on sale and only a few pounds more." He replied, as he started to unshrink the books he had purchased before Hermione stopped him.

"Why don't you use my office? That way Ron won't be in and out bothering you and I can work out here." Hermione said, knowing that it was easier for Harry to focus on writing a paper when he wasn't focused on watching a potion.

"You wouldn't be bothering me if you were in there. These potions only have an hour to go until they're done anyway. There's no point in sitting here watching them." Harry pointed out, ready to argue his point when he saw the concession within her eyes.

"Alright, just let me grab my books I'm reading through." She said, as she started levitating a large and heavy stack of books in front of her before following Harry into the office they would be sharing all summer.

While Harry's desk was precariously bare, Hermione's was covered in neat stacks of parchment, books, and muggle notebooks more than likely filled to the brim with notes on random thoughts or ideas that she ran across or just re-writes of her old school notes for their NEWT-level courses. Harry poured over book after book and in a very Hermione like manner, took notes as read, marking down the title of the book and the page number when he thought he found something useful to his research. When he was on only his second book he heard Hermione breathe a deep breath that sounded like a sigh before making her way over to his desk.

"Do you mind if I show you something?" she asked, pulling her chair up next to his as she picked up his first discarded book.

"If it will make the writing process go faster, by all means please do. " He said, knowing he still had to go back over his first two papers for Herbology and Potions that he had already asked her to look over.

"The writing process? Yes. The researching part? Yes and No. If you like these methods then by all means use it. It will be slow from the start but you'll speed up with time and once you get to know your books better, it's helpful to know roughly which book to go to, to look up that one piece of information that is eluding you. What you do is as you go through the book and you find something you want to use in your paper, take an index card and on one side write down the page number, and the quote or fact that you want to use in the paper. On the other side write down the name of the book, the author, and when the book was published for your works cited page. Once you gather what you think is enough for your paper, do at least thirty to fifty more. You don't have to include the information in your paper, but it's better to have more than you need than not enough. From there you need to write out an outline for your paper. Once you have your outline written go through your cards and lay them in piles based on what point in your essay it covers. If it covers more than one point then take a different colored index card and write '_Cross Reference_ _Card_' on it and put it in the new pile and leave the other card in the original pile. Once that is done you've basically already pre-written your essay and all you have to do is write it out." Hermione replied; glad to see it when it seemed like a light bulb went on inside his head. "At first it won't seem like it saves you any time but you should have the hang of it by the time we return to Hogwarts and it will really make a difference then."

"I'll definitely give it a try. ." Harry said, before returning back to his essay writing, or really doodling on a scrap sheet of paper that he was trying to hide from Hermione.

"Get back to working on your paper, you have to be at the shop at six am and it's already seven. If you don't get that paper finished soon you'll have us both up all night due to your negligence." She said, scolding him even though he had started on the paper as soon as he was capable of.

"It's not my fault I didn't have the books I needed to write the papers." Harry said softly, attempting to defend himself.

"That's something you can rectify tomorrow. Do like I do, look in the reference sections of books you already own or look in the Bibliography if it has one. From there if you just really want to be a nerd you can pick up copies of _Potions Monthly _and _Herbology Monthly. _ They'll list any books that have come out or are being reviewed during that month's period as well as something known as _Reading Club Monthly _where they list the top ten books picked by readers for that month's edition on "must-have" potions books etc. as all major subjects of magic have a monthly magazine, some even have weekly editions if the demand is large enough. Check with Miss Matthews first and see if any of the lists have true stock to them but if they do it would be a good way to build your book collection so that you can write a paper on anything." She said, almost forgetting to stop and breathe which earned her a smile from Harry as he adjusted his glasses on his face before he nodded his head in agreement before returning his attention back to the paper in front of him. He heard Hermione rummaging through the shelves behind him and to his left but thought nothing of it until the thump of a book being placed down on his desk brought him back to reality. There were in fact two books and he was beginning to wonder why Hermione had never mentioned them before. The first was titled _How to Get a Perfect Score on Your OWL Essays, _the second was _How to Get a Perfect Score on Your NEWT Essays _and the final book was _How to Get a Perfect Score on Your Hogwarts Essays _all by none other than Cassandra Emory. They had gone over Cassandra Emory in several of their classes as she seemed to be a master of all trades. She was the first person, other than Rowena Ravenclaw, to receive nothing less than a perfect score her entire time at Hogwarts, and Rowena Ravenclaw had done all her subjects through private tutors as was the custom before Hogwarts was built.

Deciding for the evening to just skim through the book he found the relevant sections and thanks to source cards Hermione had requested he do, he was able to put both his papers together in at right under an hour just as Hermione finally finished looking over his first essays he had asked her to.

"This actually looks ok, they would more than likely only score an EE though because you didn't go above and beyond the requirements of the paper, or rather you didn't show a full mastery of the subject. Although every teacher grades differently, did she give you a grading rubric to go with your syllabus packet?" Hermione asked, Ollivander had been a Ravenclaw and had included one for her because he knew she would ask exactly on what she was being graded on.

"No she didn't. I didn't use all of my source cards through that one either. I'll give it another hour to an hour and a half and call it a night as it's only seven thirty or so." He said, taking the papers back from Hermione before turning back to her once again.

"How'd I do on my first two papers?" he asked, actually worried that she hadn't mentioned anything about it.

"You actually did wonderful but they were half opinion papers so that's not all that surprising then. Definitely an 'O' by any Hogwarts teacher's standards but this is for a Mastery so you'll find out tomorrow. Go to the bookcase there in the back and in the cabinet underneath labeled binders are several binders. Why don't you grab some page protectors and slip the parchment inside and then put the page protectors in the binder so it doesn't get wrinkled as yours are known to do." Hermione said, laughing at the mock scowl Harry sent her way before doing as she had instructed.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

* * *

That afternoon Remus showed up in their backyard, having been given access to the wards that where placed around the Granger property just as Hermione finished putting a snack together for the boys and herself.

"Just so you know Alastor will be here tomorrow morning at 5:00 AM so be ready for him. For today we're just going to go over what we'll be covering this summer and into next school year. I know Hermione and Harry did research on a few forms of soul magic but you'll have to understand soul magic a lot better than that to be able to truly understand what is required to create, and thus, destroy a Horcrux." He said, after having been let in and a cup of tea being placed in front of him.

"We'll start with general soul magic. From there we'll branch into what is known as 'light soul magic' which covers things like auras, soul healing, soul retrieval, and shamanic journeying. After we finish that we'll go into what is considered the darker part of soul magic. Spiritual pacts, blood magic, blood quills, and then we'll cover the psychological makeup that is actually required for a person to be dark enough to create a Horcrux and then we'll go over how they are created and hopefully through all of this we can figure out how to destroy them." He said, glad to see at least Hermione and Harry where paying attention while Ron stuffed his face with a pastry that Hermione had made, although he could tell Ron was halfway paying attention.

"For now, I want a paper on what you think soul magic is; no research on this one. Just what your conceived notion is and why you think it. Tomorrow we'll go over it and then start in on the light soul magic portion." Remus said, looking over at the three teenagers who acted as if the weight of the world was on their shoulders most of time, and in reality it truly was.

Knowing there was nothing he could do about it, they made small talk, never once bringing up Sirius Black, even though it probably would have been a good thing for Harry to talk about it; something was simmering under the surface and Hermione was worried he would eventually have one of his famous Potter blow-outs when he got angry.

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Later that evening as they were getting ready for bed, and attempting to sort out their sleeping arrangements all their orders came in within ten minutes of each other. The order of phials had come in and was larger than Professor Dumbledore had said it would be while the order of books showed ten per shop instead of five which surprised them.

When their OWL scores arrived shortly after the order from the apothecary however they stared at them for a moment before Hermione shook her head.

"Honestly boys. Just open them." She said, her hands shaking as she opened the letter that contained her OWL results; skimming it before grinning from ear to ear.

"I passed Ancient Runes, Arithmancy, , Astronomy, Care of Magical Creatures, Charms, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Herbology, History of Magic, Potions, Transfiguration, Muggle Studies as well as my International Divination NEWT. All with an _Outstanding_." She said, grinning as the boys looked at their results.

"Astronomy, Care, Charms, Divination, Defense, Herbology, History of Magic, Muggle Studies, Arithmancy, and Ancient Runes, thanks to you, as well as Potions and Transfiguration. Surprisingly all of mine are _Outstanding's_ other than Astronomy and History of Magic where I got '_Exceeds Expectations' _" Harry said, shocked beyond belief that he had done as well as he had; he really needed to get something nice for Hermione when he could get away from her for a moment or so.

" I got 8 OWLs over all. In Defense and Divination I got _Outstanding's_. From there Charms, Care of Magical Creatures, Herbology, Potions and Transfiguration I got _Exceeds Expectations_ and an _Acceptable _for Astronomy." Ron said, smiling at the fact he had passed his Potions OWL, he had been the most scared for that one. "So that's while Dumbledore had us working with you on potions." He said, looking over at Hermione who gave him a curt nod. "Harry is that why you were taking the Advanced Review Sessions? To take the courses you didn't in Third Year?" he asked, not surprised when he got a nod in the positive.

"Professor Dumbledore, Ron." She said, almost absent-mindedly as she went to check on the potions that they had left to sit for a while. They gave each other a congratulatory hug before placing the rather large order of phials, on an empty shelf in test tube racks which came complementary with their phial order because of the large quantity that was purchased.

"Yes. I realized how limited I made my career choices by not taking Arithmancy and Ancient Runes and I don't always want to be having to chase dark wizards the rest of my life; one psychopath is more than enough for me." He said, with a chuckle that sounded less than humorous to Hermione's ears but not surprisingly went right over Ron's head. He never was one for catching sarcasm coming from someone else's mouth.

From there Ron and Harry where told the twenty book titles where to be browsed quickly to see the subject matter before being filed alphabetically by subject in Hermione's office for pursing at another date and time.

Hermione finished decanting most of the potions before her boys had even finished placing the handful of books up, watching as they sat there trying to do it manually. Hermione laughed which caught their attention as, with a flick of her wand, the books found themselves in their proper places as both Harry and Ron blushed at forgetting that they could do magic over the summer this year.

When they finally closed the brewing rooms' door they turned their attention to the matter of where they were going to sleep. Hermione just shook her head before enlarging her Queen size mattress into a bed large enough for all of them, as the boys watched her with a raised eyebrow before she left them to change for the evening.

Gathering up a pair of pajamas that she believed had one time belonged to Harry but had been given to her over either Yule break or their summer break she slipped into her bathroom before placing the pajamas on the stand next to her tub before beginning her nightly routine. Hermione was far from stupid and anyone would agree with that in a heartbeat. When she had attempted to take all twelve courses she learned within the first week that she had to create time for herself at some point during each week or she would have lost her mind. It was Ginny Weasley, now one of her best friends, alongside Harry and Ron, which had come up with the idea. Water magic was well known throughout the magical communities, so much so that it at one time was studied at any of the magical schools but as times changed and it had become strictly a female form of magic it was pulled from the curriculum . Ginny had told Hermione that if she was insistent on taking all twelve courses then she was going to learn the art of water magic inside and out to keep the older girl from losing her mind. It truly was the only thing that kept Hermione from losing her mind all of Third Year.

* * *

_Two weeks into Hermione's Third Year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Hermione was currently in the dorm she shared with Parvati Patil, Lavender Brown, and up to her eyebrows in homework attempting to get ahead so that she wasn't at risk of falling behind in her school work._

_As she left their shared dorm room she made her way to the library which was unfortunately very busy. Over the summer almost every student at Hogwarts had decided to study more this coming year and to get their grades up to the level that they, or their parents, had set as their own personal standard. This was usually the number one spot for their certain grade level._

_First year students that where muggle born where worried about being behind their fellow classmates that had grown up with either both feet, or just one foot, within the wizarding world where scattered in groups of friends they had made on the train and in the first two weeks of their classes. They didn't know the customs that dictated the Wizarding World and, therefore, Hogwarts itself. _

_They rightfully assumed that with the help of their friends, and a few information digging sessions they would at least find enough to help them dictate the cunning politics that where weaved in and around being a first year within a magical school. Most first year classes had their very first tests coming up which covered an insane amount of information that the first years weren't using to processing so quickly; what they didn't realize was it would only get worse as they progressed through their years at Hogwarts._

_Hermione was at the library to meet with the first year students to help them manage their work load and find a way to gather all the information that they felt they needed to know. This was their first official meeting and Hermione was determined to make a good impression. She had already purchased the students homework planners and journals, as Ginny and Lavender said that keeping a journal helped them their first year for processing their emotions of being away from home, even if Ginny's second diary her first year was cursed with a piece of Tom Riddle's soul._

_Finding the first year Gryffindor's in the back of the library in a private study room they had booked she immediately spotted Dennis Creevey, and Natalie McDonald but other than that she didn't know the other first years names and for that reason she started with introductions._

_She paid no attention to Dennis or Natalie's introductions as she already knew them pretty well but she did pay attention to the other eight students._

"_My name is Nicole Brown." A very young looking first year said, she had hair that matched her name shake that reminded Hermione of her uncontrollable hair that she had struggled with since her youth. "My favorite subject is Potions, aside from the teacher, but my favorite class based on the teacher would be Charms. My least favorite would be History of Magic." _

"_My name is Brandi Bouie. My favorite subject would be History of Magic, even if Binn's could put a ghost to sleep and my , the class I struggle in would be Potions." She said, smiling at Nicole as the girl looked at her shyly._

_Introductions went around the circle and then Hermione introduced herself to her group of first year Gryffindors._

"_My name's Hermione Granger. I'm a third year student; my favorite subject that you all would be familiar with is Charms but my overall favorite is Arithmancy and Ancient Runes which are fascinating." She said, glad to see Nicole and Brandi's eyes lite up as she mentioned Arithmancy and Ancient Runes._

"_I've already started working on Ancient Runes and basic Arithmancy work." Brandi said, as Nicole echoed her statement._

"_Do you have any of your work with you?" She asked, they seemed like they truly enjoyed the subject which made her wonder how far they had looked into it as just first years; but they were pure-bloods so she wouldn't be surprised if they had private tutors._

_Pulling the work from their bag Hermione slipped it into a file folder to show Professor Babbling and Professor Vector; if they enjoyed it that much it would be a waste for them to wait until their third year to take both classes._

"_Now I have a few presents for you. The first is a planner so you can put down all your homework in it so you do not lose track and you know what to expect. The second are muggle notebooks. If you come across something that is either confusing or that you find you enjoy but want to expand on further write it down so you don't forget it. The final gift is a journal; this is the first time away from home for most of you and it is usual a tough time for first years writing in a journal and getting your feelings down on paper so it will help you process it. Writing letters home is helpful to. Tell your parents the friends you've made, tell them the courses you enjoy and the ones your struggling in; for those of you that are not muggle born your parents can recommend books. For those of you that are muggle born, or even those of you that are not, come to me if you want to read more on something. I tend to keep lists of helpful books on certain subjects." She said, handing them several papers that where from her first and second year at Hogwarts, glad to see that they were excited about the lists._

"_Some of these aren't available at Hogwarts but you can always owl order them from Flourish and Blotts or Tomes and Scrolls. I included order forms for both bookstores." From here she pulled several stacks of books from her bag, handing three to each student. "The first is Hogwarts: A History, the second is called A Wizards Guide to Straight O's and the final book is Managing Your Time When There Isn't Enough, which is a really good time management book that should help you schedule your time more effectively." _

_Hermione spent the next two hours looking over their homework and reviewing their study notes for their first tests before she divided the students off based on their worst and best subjects, which matched up very well._

"_Try and meet up twice a week or more to go over the material you're struggling with and to just get to know some of your classmates better. Feel free to try and get students from other houses to join you as it will help you all in the long run."_

_Their session finally came to an end as Hermione gathered the books she was checking out before making her way back to her dorm room where she found herself cornered by Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil and Guinevere Weasley who had enlarged one of the beds so there was enough room for all of them as they were surrounded by mountains of books and vials upon vials of potions and crèmes._

"_We have commandeered your time for at least the next three hours." Ginny said, guiding Hermione to the bed and forcing the older girl to sit down as Lavender and Parvati did the same. "We understand you want to take all twelve classes and that is your choice to do so, make that eleven since you dropped Divination. That's fine and it's your choice to make but with that being said you are going to have to take time for yourself at least once a day and then from there once or twice a week." _

"_First are your everyday potions, brews, tinctures, balms, lotions and make-up." Lavender said, as she started thumbing through a book as Parvati began rummaging through the vials and brews that where sitting in a pile on the bed they were all sitting upon. "It's not about the make-up or the beauty care. It's about making yourself feel good. For your everyday potions we have a Multi-Vitamin which will guarantee that you are getting the full array of vitamins you'll need. The second potion is called a Skin-Hair-Nails potion, which helps keep your skin clear, your hair growing, and your nails stronger. The third and fourth are Pepper-Ups and Sleeping Draughts. You have to give yourself eight hours of sleep a night or you will burn out; at the least you need to sleep five hours a night. From there we move onto the beauty and skin potions. The first is a pain potion for your menstrual cramps; we've roomed with you long enough to know that you should have been on one as soon as your started your menstrual cycle and I wished we had spoken up sooner. It works different than a regular pain potion and targets your menstrual cramps specifically. From there we move onto skin care. The first bottle," she said holding up a bottle that held a light green potion inside it, "is a seaweed cream cleanser. Place it on a cotton ball and use it as a facial cleanser. After that you'll use the foaming cleanser and then the gel cleanser. It really helps to use them both as it cleans your face twice and the gel cleanser feels really good on your skin. From there is the seaweed lotion, which helps keep acne at bay as it's not a lotion in the usual sense, it works the same as the cleanser but is meant to be left on once it has been applied. Your next step will be to apply a facial cold cream to your face which you'll was off. Once that has dried then you'll apply a face moisturizer and then an eye cream. Even though we don't have wrinkles or crow's feet around our eyes yet, it is best to do it as a preventative measure. Three times a week you need to apply a mask. The first mask is a clay mask and the second mask is a whitening mask which will help even out sun spots. The final mask is a drying mask which will help dry up any excess oil. You also have a Blemish Blitzer that will remove any acne spots that still intend to show themselves." _

"_From there we'll move onto make-up." Parvati said, pulling out a bag of make-up that was larger than Hermione had ever seen a girl at Hogwarts use before. "Your first step is to apply a foundation primer which will feel a bit oily but will help your foundation stay on. After that with either a brush or a sponge, apply a foundation and be sure to blend it down into your neck line and the contours and edges of your face. After that either a pressed or loose powder will off-set the look. A little peach blush would off set your skin color and eye color very well. From there spray this on," Parvati said, holding up a spray bottle, "this is a setting powder that will help your make-up stay on all day. After that put a little bit of your foundation primer over your eyelids and blend it very well. From there add a little bit of eye shadow, either one or two colors and use a small eye shadow brush to blend the colors. After that you're in the home stretch. Use an eyelash curler to curl your eyelashes and then apply a thin coat of mascara. Give it five seconds to dry and then reapply it at least once but three coats is what we usually do."_

_Here Ginny picked up on the hair care to help keep Hermione's bushy hair under control._

"_For your hair it's going to be a little bit more complicated. First off, unless you have really oily hair you need to wash your hair only once every other day, unless it helps keep the frizz under control. We've swapped you to a shampoo and conditioner that helps control frizz. Wash it every other day, and be sure to run your hands through your hair to get all the tangles out. After you use the frizz control use a deep conditioner and let it sit for five minutes. When you bath, use a body wash or soap scent that you love. Once out of the shower use a dry loofah and pumice stone if you have dry skin or a callous that needs to be removed before you apply a lotion. From there move onto your hair, apply an anti-frizz potion to it, from the roots to mid-shaft and then style it as you like." Once again Lavender picked back up._

"_For stress control, try and take a bath at least twice a week. Use the prefects bathroom and add scents or bubbles; anything that relaxes you. Make a ritual out of it. Light candles that you've anointed with an essential oil towards your goal for that day or week. Add bath salts or Epsom salt to help you relax and add a few drops of essential oil or flower petals to the water as it helps with the visual aspect of the relaxation. Maybe even add a gemstone to the water such as a Crystal Quartz which absorbs negativity."_

_The next few hours where spent teaching Hermione different make-up application techniques as well as personal massage to help her relax even further and as Hermione left them to take her first ritualized bath, she found herself grateful for having roommates and friends like them._

* * *

Candles that were kept in a rather deep cabinet above her toilet where pulled down and placed in their usual spots. From there two clear crystal quartz where placed on opposite sides and corners of the bathtub before she grabbed a handful of Dead Sea Salt Bath Salts into the water before she allowed herself to submerge into the water, enjoying the steam inhalation that the bath salts gave her. Staying in the bathtub for as long as the water was warm she exited before using a dry loofah on her skin, quickly followed by a rich lotion that always made her feel better. From there talc powder was liberally added to her skin before she pulled on her pajamas and began the now rather quick process of rolling her hair with the Velcro rollers she had become so fond of. From there it was on to countless bottles, some muggle, some potions, as she cleaned her skin and then applied an acne cream to help keep her acne under control. Since she had started mixing muggle and magical acne medicines at the age of fourteen, no one could tell that she had ever had acne at any period during her life and she noticed that as long as she kept up the routine it only came back around her monthly cycle and even then after applying a drying mask it would go away within twenty-four to forty-eight hours. If she had enough of her _Pimple Vanisher _then it would vanish instantly but she was currently out which reminded her that she needed to add that to her list of things to get while in Diagon Alley the next day.

"How exactly is this going to work?" Harry said, motioning to the one bed then back to all three of them.

"It's not when my parents come home but they'll be gone for the first month anyway. I call dibs on the middle, end of story, because I'm by far the smallest out of the three of us." She said, knowing in reality she just wanted to sleep there because that's where she always slept. "Ron, what time do you have to be at _Flourish and Blotts _tomorrow?" she asked as they started the process of figuring out how to get all three of them in the bed, which only caused Hermione to laugh as she climbed into the middle and then gave both boys a self-satisfied smirk when they slowly started to move to flank either side of her.

"Seven in the morning, Harry you go in at six right?" he asked, winching in sympathy when Harry verbalized a positive answer. "What about you Hermione?" he asked, turning to slightly face her from where he was attempting to lay down, but still leave some space between them.

"I don't have to be in until lunch time but I was going actually browse _Tomes and Scrolls _and _Flourish and Blotts, _once I inventory the books Mr. Ollivander gave me and compare it against the ones I can actually get without having to wait on my license from the Ministry for certain spell-crafting and ritual-crafting books." She said, yawning before burrowing down in her blanket and pillow. "We have to get started on our work for Occulumency on top of the brewing, growing, and apprenticeships. We'll do a schedule after we meet with them tomorrow. We also have to start looking through that book on" _yawn _"Candle Magic and" _yawn _"Aromatherapy" She said, noticing that both the boys where well on their way to dream land before deciding to follow them.

If they were honest with themselves; it was probably the best night's sleep any of them had gotten in a long time.


	8. Chapter 8

**Carnival of Rust  
Chapter Eight**

* * *

Saturday found Hermione awake at four in the morning as she managed to slip out of bed without waking the boys. After changing to some respectable muggle clothing she made her way downstairs she first started a pot of coffee, as well as a pot of tea, before she made her way back to the library before putting up a silencing charm so as to not wake the boys before they had to be up. Going over to Harry's desk she pulled out his typed list of Potions and Herbology texts before going back and adding what he had purchased the night before. Once that was finished she moved onto getting his bag ready for the day, throwing in two different kinds of cauldrons, several stirring rods and some very basic ingredients. From there she pulled all the vials that he had brewed the day before into a vial carrying case, which held the vials firmly so they wouldn't break, before adding that to his bag as well.

Once that was done she set aside Harry's bag and then moved on to putting together Ron's bag which would be much simpler than Harry's. First she found a few books on the art of book binding before moving on to several books that where suggested reading lists in a series entitled _The Well-Read Witch or Wizard, _knowing that would help impress his Master and Teacher. After she made a copy of her originals she placed the copies into Ron's bag before placing her copies into her own undectable extension charm bag. Since she knew she would spend the most of the day going over notes and possibly helping Mr. Ollivander stock she only packed the bare minimal of her books since she wasn't sure how much time she would actually have on her hands to read after she had gone to the bookstore to get Harry and Ron some books on their chosen fields.

Remembering the tea and coffee she had started down stairs she emptied both containers into their respective carafes before she started the toast and beans, all of which finished up in a matter of a few minutes as she manual cut up some fruit for herself to go along with their starch heavy meal. Carefully levitating everything onto a large tray as well as three tea cups and three coffee cups she levitated the tray in front of her as she started going back up the stairs at a slower rate than before.

Entering the room she immediately noticed that Harry started moving as soon as the smell of the tea and coffee whiffed over to his nose, while Ron was more than likely moving due to the smell of the beans and toast, which happened to be one of the boys favorites.

"Mmh…food?" Ron asked, barely even remotely awake as he sat up with a sideways grin on his face.

"Yes food. If you spill this on my bed I'll skin you both so up and cracking boys, we'll eat in the office. Eat first then grab a shower. Harry you have an hour until you have to be at Miss Matthews so that gives you time for a shower. When Harry leaves Ron, you can start getting ready and by the time you're done it will be time for you to leave. When you leave I'm going to head over to _Tomes and Scrolls _since you'll be at _Flourish and Blotts _today to gather some books we'll all need for our apprenticeships and then I'll head over to Mr. Ollivander's for lunch. I'll be later than both of you getting back so when you return Harry start on any potions you need to. If you have none keep going down our list and triple the batches. I should be back by dinner time, if either of you need me I'll be eating in the office at my desk. There are also two bags for you on your desks with what you'll need for the day, as well as a few extra books that you may want to take and a lunch bag. From there is a list of things that need to be done when you return from your Orientation for your apprenticeships, I have my own list for when I get back that is twice as long as yours so don't shrink on your list." She said before taking her breakfast into the office, with the boys' now awake, right behind her.

"We can't afford to shrink on it Hermione. Not with what's started happening. War is coming whether we're ready for it or not and I don't know about the two of you but I intend to survive this war even if it means working around the clock to do so." Harry said, glad when Ron nodded his head in agreement, he would have preferred a verbal answer but Ron wasn't human before a few cups of tea or coffee.

"Ron I need you to keep an eye out for _Magical Theory _books. I don't care if they're older than our Year One textbook or newer. I'll need it for my apprenticeship and I think Harry may as well." Hermione said, knowing that even if Ron was a little thick at times, he would do as she asked, for fear of her wrath.

Ron mumbled an answer through a full mouth that sounded like 'will do' but there was never any way of telling with Ron so Hermione just took what she could get and watched as Harry stood to leave for his apprenticeship, pulling out a ring that was on a necklace that Hermione hadn't noticed before.

"Best of luck today guys, Ron if you're late I'll have your hide. Hermione, best of luck." He said, grinning at both of them before touching the port key as he was whisked away to the Apothecary in Diagon Alley for his first day before Hermione turned her attention to Ron.

"Go get a shower and find your nicest robes. We really should have taken you robe shopping before today…" here Ron cut her off with a grin.

"They ordered robes for me. They should be waiting at the shop for me. Oh while you're in _Tomes and Scrolls _ you might want to pick up a copy of _The Apprentices Guide to their Trade_ it's a rather large tomb but it covers the types of robes that apprentices wear and what they mean and what it takes to get to that level. I'd say just get one copy and we can copy the book, unless you want to get regular copies for yourself in case the copy charm messes up." Ron said, before disappearing into the bathroom to get a quick shower before he had to leave for his first day.

Once Ron was dressed in a pair of plain robes he took a glance at his watch before grabbing his portkey as he was whisked away right on time for his first day.

Hermione took her time getting ready for her first day as she had plenty of time before she had to be there but by the time she was dressed and applied a socially acceptable amount of make-up for someone working on an apprenticeship an owl had arrived from Mr. Ollivander.

_Miss Granger,_

_The shop is relatively slow this morning. In fact I haven't had any customers, would you like to come in early and we will have a morning tea and start discussing your apprenticeship and the ins and outs of it? There is a lot to discuss and if we can get most of the discussing out of the way you can start on the first several books that need to be learned before you can start actually crafting wands. There is no need to fire-call, just come on by when you can and if you have previous plans and cannot make it until lunch that is fine._

_Ollivander, Wand Maker _

Hermione quickly placed the letter on her desk as the owl flew off back towards Mr. Ollivander before she checked her appearance in the mirror, grabbed her ever-extendable bag, and then touched the port key around her neck, remembering the feeling of being pulled up by the navel as she landed in front of Mr. Ollivander's wand shop. She looked at the shop for a while before steeling herself and walking into the shop to begin her first day of her apprenticeship.

Hermione entered the shop and heard the now familiar jingle of the bell above the shop's door as Ollivander shouted down the stairs from his personal home above the shop.

"I'll be right down Hermione. There's tea in the store room I just have to finish sending out another owl." He said, his voice carrying through a _Sonorous Charm_ down the stairs to Hermione. Hermione didn't bother replying as she entered the storeroom to find that it was still in a state of disarray, she hoped she wouldn't have to sort it by herself but if she did she would understand why. There was a lot of learning that a person had to do before they actually started on the crafting on wands but for now she turned her attention back to the tea that was sitting on a small table in the storage room next to what Hermione assumed was a worktable that Ollivander used to craft wands.

Hermione poured herself a cup of tea just as Ollivander entered the room, and upon noticing his entrance she waved her wand and immediately poured another cup of tea for him.

"Thank you Hermione. Now down to business I assume you've at least read one of the books that I sent home with you. What do you think of the history of wand-crafting?" he asked, as he took another sip of tea, smiling to himself.

"I wasn't able to find that much in what you sent me on the history of wand-crafting other than the fact that the art of the wand came about from someone accidently picking up a stick made of Yew and using it during a ritual." Hermione said, blushing at the admission.

"Do you have the books with you? There should have been a lot more there than that." He said, raising his eyebrows in confusion.

Hermione nodded her head and reached into her bag before calling forth the box she had labeled as "_box from Ollivander's" _glad when the box shot up into her hand as called before handing it to Mr. Ollivander who immediately began thumbing through the box at an alarming rate.

"Well no wonder. This is a box I meant to give you but there were supposed to be four more boxes with it. This box was meant to be the second or third box you went through." He said, giving a laugh as he summoned the other four boxes which landed in front of Hermione silently.

"They are all labeled with a number. Start with the books in the first box, each box as an information list inside that tells you what order to read them in and from there match it to your syllabus on what papers you need to write." He said, handing her the three boxes as she took a cursory glance inside each box surprised to see that the first box was strictly on _Tree Magic _and the second box was strictly on _Ingredients for Wand Cores. _The third box was for something called a Correspondence Series that he said would help her with the wand crafting and the fourth box was strictly _Magical Theory _of all sorts and sizes. "There is a lot more to wand crafting than actually making the wands. There is a lot of background knowledge that is needed before you can even dream of crafting your first wand. This course usually takes three years Miss Granger. We are going to attempt to complete it in one year. You have a time-turner now, correct?" he asked, glad to see her rise it so that he could see it before allowing it to fall back under her robes. "Good. We may or may not need it but we won't start using it until October or so if we do, the same for Ron and Harry I'd assume. Now for today we need to organize the stock room. I've had a new order of cores and wood come in and it will take the majority of the day even with both of us working on it. Tomorrow we need to organize the store room floor where I store the made wands because I can't find a wand when I need it anymore as it is a disorganized mess. I have ordered some cubicles measured to the size of the wand boxes and then I've also purchased a stand to display the wand polish as well as the wand holsters. Why don't you start with the cores, thirty cores per jar, unless it's small like unicorn hairs then sixty per jar; when in doubt just ask, no harm in asking a question I dare say." Ollivander said as he looked out at the sea of boxes that where in front of them. "I'll start on the woods, if you'll start on the cores and then we'll swap after we stop for lunch." He said giving her his usual smile, " I want you to get a feel for the cores and the woods but you will need to work on meditation if you have not already started doing so as it will help you get a feel for their properties beyond what is recited in all the books, that is how you know what kind of wand to make." He said, glad to see her nod and immediately start unboxing cores which came in crates of five hundred before she found herself wondering where to find the glass jars at.

"The glass jars are in the boxes up against the wall behind you. Once we get everything put away and labeled we'll probably need to reorganize it a little as it seems every time I make an order I have to shift some things around. They're in alphabetical order by the way." He said which something Hermione was glad for. She started the repetitious process of unboxing the cores. From there she moved on to placing them in their jars before shelving them, making sure the old product was towards the front of the shelving units.

With the aid of magic on the cores and two people working on it, they had the store room in top shape in under three hours, just in time for an afternoon tea break, which Ollivander seemed keen on.

"I'm surprised at how strong your magic is Miss Granger. It is no wonder they call you the brightest witch of your age. Now your first order of business will be to take this note to the Ministry of Magic. It registers you as my apprentice. From there you are to go to the Office of Records and hand them a letter I will give you which will get you access to the books. The clerk will pull them for you. Take your bag with you; I've noticed it has an undectable extension charm on it which is brilliant by the way. This will take you at least a few hours so go ahead and go home after you have finished and I'll see it at eight tomorrow morning, we'll do a lecture in the morning and then start working on the Tree Magic course lecture. Be sure to read the first three chapters in the first book on _Tree Magic _by tomorrow as that's what we'll be covering in the lecture portion tomorrow morning. Now off with you, you have books to go get at the ministry and studying to do Miss Granger but before I forget here are your apprentice robes." Mr. Ollivander said, handing her a set of silk black robes with white trim on them to show her status as a wand maker's apprentice, as well as the fact she was considered a year one apprentice. Once Hermione expressed her thanks for the robes as well as the books Mr. Ollivander showed her to the floo connection that would take her to the Leakey Cauldron which would allow her to exit back into muggle London and make her way to the Ministry from there.

It took longer than it should have at the Ministry to collect only a measly two hundred books that where restricted due to them being about a person's magical core and certain aspects of wand making before she was finally able to make her way to Hogsmeade Village to pick up a few books at _Tomes and Scrolls. _


	9. Chapter 9

**Carnival of Rust  
Chapter Nine**

* * *

Thanks to Hermione's probing Harry managed to make his way to the apothecary earlier than anticipated and arrived a full ten minutes before six, not surprised to see Miss Matthews already inside the shop. When he entered the shop he saw her head come up and smiled at him as he made his way over to her.

"Well good morning. You're early, that's always a good sign. There's tea in my office. Why don't you go pour a cup and I'll along right behind you." She said, as she continued reading over the piece of parchment she had been reading when he entered the storefront.

Pouring them both a cup of tea he wasn't too surprised to see her enter the office right behind him and take the only other open seat at the table.

"Did you manage to get your work done? I realized I threw that on you at the last minute." She said, not surprised when Harry handed her what she thought where two essays and two booklists. "I'll look this over in a few minutes. Today you're going to be sorting an order that came in for me, I'm beginning to ramp up for Hogwarts sales in September. I know the basics of what is covered every year which is what we'll be working on now but in the middle of July, or usually earlier, I get an owl from both Professor Snape and Professor Sprout on additional things that have been added and for what year and a list of students who are working on private studies, advanced studies or tutoring under them and a rough idea of what will be covered per student so I know what to order for those students. That order is usually larger than this order we got today as there are a lot of students taking remedial potions under private tutors while at Hogwarts, especially if they are not Slytherins, but I know Professor Slughorn will set you all straight this year." Miss Matthews said with a laugh, which Harry agreed with as he finished the last of his tea before turning his attention to what had to be done that day.

"If you can't figure out where something goes just ask. The shop doesn't open until nine so I'm going to be working on grading your essays and regarding your essays from your older potions classes until eight if it takes that long." She said, effectively dismissing him as he dipped off into the storeroom as she started working her way through his papers.

It took Harry almost five and a half hours to work his way through the storeroom, unpacking boxes and placing the herbs in containers as well as the potions ingredients into their correct jars and then transferring the liquids into the jars they would be sold in, as they came in 42 ounce jars to the store and where broken down once they arrived.

When he entered the storeroom and noticed the sign on the door turned to '_Closed for Lunch'_ he made his way into Miss Matthews office to find her sitting there with two to-go plates from The Leaky Cauldron, as well as a bottle of butter-beer.

"Good timing Harry I was just about to call you." She said, motioning him to sit and pushing one of the to-go plates in front of him as well as a glass of butter-beer that had been untouched. "How much more do you have left?" she asked, surprised to hear his answer.

"I finished it all." He said, noticing the look of shock upon her face. "Snape gave me lots of detentions for the smallest of infractions so I've learned how to handle a stock room or supply room very well over my years at Hogwarts." He said, giving a dry laugh before he started in on his sandwich that had been provided for him.

"Knowing Snape I'm not that surprised, and there was definitely some bias in his paper grading. Every teacher grades different but some of his remarks show the bias very clearly, stating that you have not covered something in depth enough when you actually have. I noticed a big improvement from your essays towards the beginning of first year and after Halloween of your first year, any reason for that?" she asked, pausing to take a sip of her drink as Harry laughed.

"I became best friends with the girl that has always held the number one ranking in our year every single school year and term for that matter." He said, leaving out just how they had become best friends, the troll incident wasn't one of his more well-known episodes and he preferred to keep as many under wraps as he could. "I believe since first year I have always gotten a homework planner and a few books for Christmas from her. Although she does choose books that I'm more than likely going to read thankfully." He said, laughing at his own private joke.

"Well it did you very well and it seems you might have misunderstood me yesterday when I said do the first two essays. I meant do one for Herbology and one for Potions; I didn't mean do the first two essays for _each _subject. Although it does show dedication but in the future if you think you've misheard something ask for clarification on it; you're working on a lot this summer and I don't want you working yourself into the ground." She said, before handing him back all four essays that he had given her surprised to see them all marked with an _Outstanding _ across the top. Harry had never received an Outstanding in potions, _ever _which caused him to grin.

"You can look over your re-graded essay for Hogwarts later. Right now you are to take this list and fill it and then place it inside one of our ever-extending shipping crates and shrink it." She said, handing him a rather long list that rolled itself out onto the floor when Miss Matthews handed it to him.

"Yes ma'am." Was all he said as he set about pulling the items from the list, surprised to see there where several books on there, which he skipped over as she didn't have them in stock at the store. It took him only an hour and a half to fill the massive order, leaving the crate in the storeroom before heading to the workroom where he found Miss Matthews brewing a few potions for customers as the store had only been busy through owl-order his first day it seemed.

"You've gotten to the book portion of that order haven't you?" she asked, laughing when she assumed he nodded even though she had her back to him. "There's some money sitting on the table over there. Should be thirteen galleons, run over to _Flourish and Blotts _and grab the books for me would you, they should be waiting behind the counter." She said, watching from the corner of her eye as he pocketed the money and made for the door. "Do you not have a traveling cloak?" she asked, turning to fully face him this time.

"No ma'am. Hogwarts never required one and I made do with my winter cloak in the colder months." He said, realizing that had probably been a mistake in not acquiring one earlier in his school career.

"Go finish the book order and take the money that is left from what I gave you there and get three traveling cloaks." She said, handing him four more galleons before sending him on his way.

Harry made his way to _Flourish and Blotts _at an average speed as it was only right up the alley which was bustling with people for it to be after lunch on a Saturday. Upon entering the bookstore he looked for Ron but was unable to locate him as he made his way up to the counter and asking the sales witch for the book order for the Apothecary, handing over the appropriate number of Galleons when the price was recited before he made his way to _Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions_, glad to see that no one was inside as he was greeted by the owner herself.

"Yes ma'am, I need three plain traveling cloaks." He said, hoping that he would be able to get them in black, he wasn't very fond of drawing attention to himself.

"Right away, if you'll step up onto this stool I'll have your measurements in a jiffy and you'll be out of her with the cloaks in less than ten minutes. Regular fastenings I assume?" she asked, glad when Harry gave a nod, although it wasn't the fanciest order, it meant it would be a quick sale, and quick sales made for happy, and return, customers.

True to her word Harry was out of the shop in under ten minutes, with a traveling cloak around his shoulders and a package containing his other two robes and on his way back to the apothecary. Once he re-entered the apothecary and placed the books into the massive order that they had received he shrank the box before taking it and entering Miss Matthew's brewing room.

"You finished the order then?" she asked as she never took her eyes of the Blood-Replenishing Potion she was working on.

"Yes ma'am." He said, going to hand her the box when she laughed.

"The box is for you and your friends. Headmaster Dumbledore told me you were attempting to test out of Year Six and Seven potions and he paid for everything in advance and just took my word on how much would be needed to brew the potions that where required to sit the Potions NEWT. The books should help as well as they list every possible potion you could be tested on during your NEWT. He actually stopped by after you left yesterday." She said, smiling at him as she finished adding the last ingredient to her potion before it had to simmer for a while. "You've done more than enough for today. Get your next two essays done for Herbology and Potions, that's one apiece unless you can manage more, the rest of your instructions are in your Syllabus as of what to look into growing and things of that nature and I'll see you next Saturday. If anything changes I'll send you an owl." She said, watching as the shock registered on Harry's face at how large of an order Professor Dumbledore placed for them once again before he came back to himself and said goodbye to Miss Matthews before shrinking the box and touching his port key to head back to Hermione's house.


	10. Chapter 10

**Carnival of Rust  
Chapter Ten**

* * *

_Authoress Note: _ Sorry it's taken so long to get something up. I'm going back through and re-doing some parts and adding to several parts and combining chapters; I'll try at get a chapter up a day from there on out.

* * *

After several cups of strong coffee Ron managed to make his way into _Diagon Alley _before making his way to _Flourish and Blott's _not surprised to find that the store was empty at such an early hour.

He located the manager a Mr. Brown, no relation to Lavender Brown, in his office just as a tea kettle started whistling.

"Mr. Weasley, pleasure to meet you, I'm Mr. Brown, owner and manager of _Flourish and Blott's _Diagon Alley location. A Miss Septa is the manager at the Hogsmeade Location, you'll meet her tomorrow. Now, fix yourself a cup of tea and we'll get started on the paperwork you'll need to go over and learn." He said, waving his wand to pour a cup of tea as Ron took a seat opposite of Mr. Brown's chair next to the fireplace.

"Now, there isn't really much to know about running a bookstore. You keep an eye on the orders that are on the shelves and stock as the books come in for special orders and then at the beginning of the school year. We get most of our new books at the beginning of July so that people can get their school shopping out of the way. Right now all our new books are starting to come in for the school year. When you receive a shipment order you'll check the order over and make sure everything is there as it should be and then place them in the stock room. When it comes time to rearrange the shelves we'll start early and should be able to get everything on the shelves before we open. July 1st is usually one of our busiest days stocking wise while the end of August is our busiest time shopping wise. You'll need to familiarize yourself with the shops layout if you don't already know it." He said, pausing to take a sip of tea before turning to Ron with a smile.

"Like I said it's a rather easy apprenticeship but the apprenticeship is just a mask, but I'm sure you've figured that out by now." He said, raising an eyebrow in Ron's direction as Ron chuckled.

"Yes sir but a mask for what?" Ron asked, leaning forward on his elbows to be closer to hear Mr. Brown.

"Books, Mr. Weasley. The headmaster and I agree that it would be beneficial for all of you to learn spell-crafting and other forms of restricted or regulated magic and between your three apprenticeships we can get you the books you'll need to know anything you could possibly need to know to defeat He-Who-must-Not-Be-Named." Mr. Brown said, glad to see Ron give a grimace of a smile.

"It's no secret that Hermione and I will be there for Harry when he needs us." He said, eyeing Mr. Brown as if he was trying to decide if he was trustworthy or not.

"And that is why we're helping you." Mr. Brown replied, nodding his head to the corner of the room where a few boxes sat. " That's everything that you, Miss Granger, or Mr. Potter could need to get started with. Some of them are rather dark books and I'll teach you the spells to keep them from being defaced or written is as well as how to charm the covers into something else if you need it to. Today you just need to spend time going through the boxes and seeing what all is there, once that's done, you need to read this book." He said, handing Ron a rather thin book. "It's just the basics of spells for protection purposes and they aren't that hard to master at all, but they are the building blocks for the rest of the spell work."

Ron just nodded his head in agreement, he could tell it was going to be a busy year or so for them.

* * *

Upon returning to Hermione's house Harry found that both Ron and Hermione where locked away in the study going through books at an alarming rate, well for Ron anyway.

"We got another order of potions and herbs from Miss Matthews at Professor Dumbledore's orders. Hermione do you think you could help me label them all and put it all up?" He asked as he pulled the small box from his pocket before making his way to brewing room with Hermione hot on his heels. She always got excited at the prospect of books, herbs, or potions ingredients which was something he had yet to come to understand in the almost six years they had been friends.

"What is in the order?" Hermione asked, knowing that Miss Matthews more than likely sent out a packing list with her orders as she was a muggle-born witch.

"Tons of stuff; it's a lot larger than the order he gave us at the start of this week. It looks like he expects us to be very busy over the course of this summer." Harry said before he tapped his wand to the small box he had set on the floor as it enlarged to its full capacity.

True to Harry's word the second order that had been placed for them was by far the largest order they had received in the short time they had been working this summer but thankfully all of the preparation work had been done to most of the ingredients, including the rat spleens, which was Harry's least favorite part of potions ingredients prep.

"We have a lot of dried muggle herbs which I thought was weird when I started packing the box. Miss Matthews didn't even tell me the box was for us just that I needed to start working on it." Harry said as he looked at the allotted cabinets they had and back at the supplies, wondering just how all of it was going to fit.

"Hermione, do you think you'd be capable of adding a storage room for us? It'd make things a lot easier and we could just use our cupboards to store our finished potions." He asked, looking at the one blank wall they had within her brewing room with interest.

"I probably could but it would be much easier to ask Professor Dumbledore to come and do it for us. He's supposed to be showing up for dinner tonight if I remember correctly, I'll just owl him and ask if he's still coming to dinner and if so we'll ask him if he can add the extra storage room for us. It's almost dinner time anyway so I need to get started on that as soon as I can." She said, looking at the giant box that was still in the middle of their brewing room.

"Why don't you get started on the letter to Professor Dumbledore and I'll get started on dinner." Harry said, knowing that she wasn't the best cook in the world but it was edible which said something.

They soon went their separate ways as Harry made his way into the kitchen to start making the enchiladas for their dinner. About the time he put them in the oven to melt the cheese he heard the tell-tale sign of a '_pop'_ which meant that Professor Dumbledore had arrived in their living room, which had been designated as the apparition point within the Granger household.

"It smells wonderful Harry. I assume Miss Granger and Mr. Weasley are upstairs?" Dumbledore asked as he entered the kitchen wearing full wizarding regalia with a style only he could pull off.

"Yes sir. Hermione should be in the office or the brewing room. Not quite sure where Ron is." He said, making him wonder exactly where Ron was.

"I'll go collect them as it looks like dinner is almost ready. It shouldn't take me long to add a storage cupboard to Hermione's brewing room so I'll do that before we nip back down." He said, before once again disappearing and reappearing on the upper-level of the house.

They returned within ten minutes, this time taking the stairs, as Hermione talked animatedly about the addition to her brewing room and the supplies they had received earlier in the day.

"Professor, are you sure on all the supplies you sent us? It's an awful lot …" she trailed off. Although Hermione wasn't poor by any means, she was money conscious as it seemed like Professor Dumbledore had been spending money left and right and had no intentions of slowing down, even if the same could be said for her.

"Like I said earlier Miss Granger, I'd rather you be well over-prepared than underprepared by any means; if it means using the interest out of a few of my vaults then so be it." He said, putting her at ease that he was only pulling the interest out of his vaults and not touching any money that he himself had put in the goblin-guarded vaults.

They talked throughout the dinner and subsequent tea about what all they had been learning through the aromatherapy course as well as the massive amounts of Potion's brewing that they had been doing. Upon seeing their greenhouse Professor Dumbledore was pleasantly surprised by the number of planets they had inside and how quickly they were growing with the right care and attention. As Professor Dumbledore left with the promise of more seeds, books, and vials Hermione turned her attention back to her personal brewing room.

Mentally deciding that there wasn't such a thing as too much Polyjuice Potion, or Pepper-Ups for that matter, Hermione began the process of starting four cauldron's apiece of Polyjuice Potion, Pepper-Up Potions, Grand Pepper-Up Potion, a Sleeping Draught, a Calming Draught, as well as a Blemish Biltzer that she was almost out of. From there she started a rather large cauldron of the Draught of Peace, as well as Essence of Dittany, a fresh batch of Flesh-Eating Slug Repellant on the off chance she would need it for her greenhouse, the Wiggenweld Potion, which could cure minor damage and awaken a person from a magical induced sleep such as the Draught of Living Death, the Grand Wiggenweld Potion and an Invigoration Draught.

Thankfully the potions she had made earlier in the summer, aside from the Polyjuice Potion, where quick to make and could be put into self-stirring cauldrons and left alone for their simmer period which meant she could focus on the rest of the potions which would require her full attention, such as the Draught of Peace and Invigoration Draught. Thirty two ounces of a potion gave her two hundred and fifty five vials. That meant she would have 1,020 vials of Polyjuice, Pepper Up, Grand Pepper Up, Sleeping Draught, Calming Draught, Essence of Dittany and Blemish Blitzer. The large cauldron she was using was 32 ounces and she had made sure to change the recipe to accommodate for that, which meant she would have 255 vials of the Wiggenweld Potion, the Grand Wiggenweld Potion and the Invigoration Draught. For the Essence of Dittany she planned to use 4 ounce jars which meant she would need eight jars for just the Dittany and she knew she didn't have that many extra on hand.

When her potions where finally at the point they could be left alone Hermione stuck her head into the office they shared to find the boys actually hard at work, reading over some of their books for their apprenticeship, which pleased Hermione to no end.

"I've got a lot of potions brewing in the lab but I need to pop over to the Apothecary to get some more vials as well as holding jars if we decide not to divide them into vials just yet. Can you keep an eye on the potions for me? I shouldn't be more than an hour." Hermione said, as Harry stood and entered the brewing room that she was still in.

"I'll do it. I want to get started on some more Aromatherapy work anyway. I need a break from working on the Herbology cataloging I'm doing." He said before pulling his glasses off his face and pinching the bridge of his nose before placing his glasses back on.

"Perfect. Do you think you'll need any more containers while I'm at the apothecary?" she asked, not wanting to have to a make a second trip for something she could pick up while she was already there.

"Not that I know of although you may just want to go ahead and throw in a few extra vials, we seem to keep running out once you get it in your head to brew something." He said, giving her a wink to let her know that he was joking as she blushed before picking up her bag and then turning back to him.

"You're probably right. Just for what I have brewing now it will take 6,885 vials and eight four ounce jars. Do you think another order of ten thousand would do or should I just go ahead and double the order to twenty thousand?" she asked, as the reality of just how many potions she had been brewing dawned on her, but as Professor Dumbledore said, it was better to be safe than sorry.

"Just go ahead and double the order to twenty thousand and you might as well get at least five hundred containers between the ¼ ounce, one ounce, two ounce, four ounce, and sixteen ounce jar containers." He said, knowing that it would give them one hundred containers per size, which would work well within their favor.

"Sounds good; like I said I should be back within the hour." She said, before touching her necklace that was her portkey before she was whisked away to Diagon Alley with a tight pull feeling within her naval.

* * *

Entering the apothecary Hermione relished in the smell of the herbs and potions ingredients, as just like her precious books, it had a calming effect on her immediately.

"What can I do for you today Miss Granger?" she asked, not surprised to see Hermione coming into the store; the girl wasn't called the brightest witch of her age by being lazy.

" A lot actually. We need twenty thousand vials, half of which I actually have to use once I get back home and then we'll need one hundred of the ¼ ounce, one ounce, two ounce, four ounce and sixteen ounce glass containers, preferably with the screw on tops." Hermione said, glancing down at her list to see if she had forgotten anything.

"Have you thought about adding any more spray bottles, I have the regular squirt bottles and then the ones with the trigger if you would prefer. I also have the 1/8 ounce glass roll on bottles if you'll be making anything to wear or lip balms as well as the plastic lip balm containers. From there the only things I have left that you don't have would be the plastic bottles with the flip-top, snap-top and disc top, which is the bottle that you press down on one side of the lid and then the other side pops up. The plastic dropper bottles for eye washes and things of that sort and a 50 ml acrylic lotion pump, a plastic deodorant container and the glass bottles with the dropper tops and finally a 64 Amber Glass Jug that would be good for storing mead if you're ever inclined to make any for ritual purposes." She said, running through the rest of her supplies, other than potions or herbology ingredients, knowing that it would be of interest to Hermione.

"What would be a good number to start out with?" Hermione asked, as they had yet to get that far into their Aromatherapy course, although anything they bought would be put to use in one way or another if Hermione had any say in it.

"At the rate you're going, and with your curiosity level, I'd say five hundred of each; if you need more you can always come back." She said, as she once again closed the sign on her door to '_Closed' _since it was past her regular closing time anyway as she motioned Hermione to follow her into the back of the store into her store room.

As they entered the store room Miss Matthews pulled down a large crate before she began the rather quick process of packing the crate for Hermione. With a final wave of her wand the package sealed itself and then shrank itself so that it would fit inside Hermione's bag that she carried with her.

"I also included one ounce, two ounce, four ounce, eight ounce and sixteen ounce Flint Jars which are used for Bath Salts, Body Butters, Muds, Balms, Clays, and Powdered Herbal Blends. From there it's the same sizes for the Flat Cream Jars which are good for lip balms or creams. There are three hundred Round Bail Jars which make for pretty displays for bath salts, herbal blends and milk baths. There are close to three hundred wooden beveled scoops which should come in handy as well as three hundred small wooden beveled scoops. From there you have a thousand Muslim Drawstring Bags in 3x5 and 4x6 as well as 10,000 small and large sealable tea bags and ten stainless steel tea ball infusers. Double-treaded Stackable Shifter Jars, the Inserts, Dome Cream Jars and Slider Tins seal the deal at a thousand a piece." She said, running through a mental check list of everything she had added on top of what they had talked about.

Hermione looked at the relatively young Potions Mistress in front of her with a look of shock upon her face at the amount of products that had been added to her order.

"Don't worry about it. Dumbledore is still paying for your orders. He gave me a rough idea what is going on. You can expect a massive order on each of your birthdays as well as at Halloween, Yule, the Spring Equinox, and right before school lets out of the year. I will _not _see the three of you go into this unprepared be it for Potions, Herbology or even something as simple as Aromatherapy to help keep you mentally sane. There are also some books in there on soap making ranging from Natural Soap Making to Milk Based Soaps. There's more in the order than that but you'll figure it out when you unpack it." She said, giving Hermione a hard look when she looked like she was about to protest.

Instead of voicing her disagreement at the massive order, or orders to come for that matter, Hermione simply allowed herself to be pulled into a hug by Miss Matthews before she made her way back to her parents' home, still in shock about the order of supplies that she had received.

Upon returning to her home she made her way back into the brewing room, as Harry was decanting one of the potions into vials.

"Get everything you need?" he asked, never taking his eyes from the potion he was working on, which made Hermione proud of him.

"Yes and then some. I'll be in the storage room, come find me if you finish before I do. This is going to take a while to put up. Miss Matthews seems to love loading us down with supplies." She said, letting Harry know with a look that Professor Dumbledore was behind it somehow.

When Harry gave her a positive answer she entered their new storage room and began the rather slow process of putting up the supplies that had been given to them. By the time Harry joined her she only had half the box put up but with his help they managed to get the rest of the box put up within ten more minutes before taking the 20,000 vial order and the 8 ounce plastic containers with them to place in the empty cupboard that they stored the supplies they knew they were going to be using soon in.

"Well there was a lot more in there than I thought. She didn't tell me about the thirteen kinds of clay she added or the two types of mud, but it makes sense because we're doing an Aromatherapy course. I did appreciate the extra salts she threw in, I think there where eleven, as well as the three types of sugar as they go into Bath Salts or Sugar Scrubs and things of that nature which we'll get to eventually in Aromatherapy." Hermione said as she started taking another partial inventory.

When her inventory was finished she was surprised to find there where eleven different kinds of vegetable butter, which she assumed was for making body butters. There was also the fruit seeds and fibers, she wasn't sure what they were for, all she knew was that they were dried and there was a lot of them for her never having heard of them. Three types of organic sea vegetables, several kinds of milk powder, and three different oils in a rather large amount, as well as three powders and oddly enough several galleons of apple cider vinegar, mica powder, silk powder and surprisingly, baking soda, citric acid, corn starch and cocoa powder which really confused her.

Putting it from her mind to deal with later Hermione made her way back into her brewing room with Harry on her heels as they finished decanting everything but the Polyjuice Potion; it would take a full month to brew.

"Harry if you could label those for me I still have time to get another set of potions going and finished before it's time to slow down for the evening." Hermione said, already running through a list of things she needed to do the next day and the next; it seemed like a never ending list of brewing, supply gathering, and working in the greenhouse.

Entering her office she pulled down the magical beauty books she had received when she started working on reversing the effects of the time-turner slowly aging a person. Finding the first potion she wanted she began the quick process of starting a cold crème that was a wonderful face cleanser. Once that was to a point it could stir itself, she started in on the seaweed lotion, or astringent, that she had come to love since she learned about it towards the end of her last term at Hogwarts the previous year.

Once those where started she started her acne buster potion, glad to have found this one when Ginny had told her about it. From there she moved onto more of what she considered practical potions. A fever-reducer potion was started as was a vomit-inducing potion, on the off chance a poison got ingested into the body. From there it was an anti-nausea potion just because it made sense to add it to the batch she was brewing. Looking through _Most Potent Potions _Hermione decided on her final potion of the day: a _Restoration Potion_ which could reverse the effects of almost any spell.

As she chopped the ingredients for the Restoration Potion Hermione allowed herself to relax just a little and enjoy the solitude of the brewing room, because she had a feeling the further they got into the summer, the less relaxed she would be.


	11. Chapter 11

**Carnival of Rust  
**_Chapter Eleven_

* * *

The Monday after Professor Dumbledore's abrupt departure had them spending most of their morning in the greenhouse either harvesting or planting to replace the herbs and magical plants that were harvested. From there Hermione would go through pages and pages of lists that where within a rather new journal that she had purchased the day before on her trip to _Tomes and Scrolls_.

"Why are you making lists Hermione? It's not like they'll be left in plant form." Harry said, as he pulled up a muggle version of the mandrake before turning his attention back to her.

"Because whether we like it or not war is upon us. It may not be here right this minute. It could be tomorrow, it could be the next two years but _war is upon us._ I for one am not going into this blindly. Some of the plants are for cooking and therefore eating. Another batch of them is strictly for potions work and the final batch is there strictly for anything related to healing that is not related to potions." She replied before going back to listing all that they had already growing in the greenhouse and what could already be harvested.

"If my math is correct," here Harry chuckled, when had the smartest witch of her age ever been wrong before," most of this will be done by the time we start back for school." She said, pushing a stray hand of hair out of her face "The herbs will grow the quickest but they always have."

Knowing Hermione was more than likely correct they kept planting and harvesting at small intervals taking from the garden only when they absolutely, had to have something from for a potion they were brewing.

Their days passed in a haze of working on the meditations for Occulumency, brewing, and tending to the green house as time seemed to slip through their fingers and before they knew it they had been at the Granger residence two weeks before Professor Dumbledore came back to check on them.

When he looked through their potions work he was surprised at how well they had done.

"You have gotten a lot done over the past two weeks and your greenhouse looks amazing Hermione." He said, not breaking eye contact with her as he tried to use Legilimency on her to no avail; the one time he managed to break through her walls he found himself within a library but unable to open any of the books which contained her memories.

"I see you have mastered Occulumency very well. I love the idea of the library, it suits your personality as does the chess game for Ron and the Qudditch Pitch for you Harry. Very well done, all of you. Professor Slughorn is impressed with your potions quality. With Professor Slughorn teaching potions all of you are eligible to take Potions this upcoming year. If you like I have your book lists. I can have them sent to you tonight."

Hermione readily agreed to that as it wouldn't take away from her Potions brewing and it was only two weeks until the Polyjuice Potion was ready.

"Professor, can you pick up some more phials for us? We've run out Miss Matthews doesn't have enough." She said, having already sent an owl to them to request more. "It'll be a few days before Miss Matthews gets anymore in."

"At the rate you're brewing I'll double the order from last time; don't worry about that," he said, waving her off as she went to hand him several Gallons. "Hogwarts is covering this and I actually brought you 4,000 phials today. For now keep brewing and working on your Herbology project, you'll have the rest of the phials by the end of the day. I would swap to working on tinctures both magical and muggle as well as pastes such as the Bruise Vanishing Crème and Burn Healing Paste."

After Professor Dumbledore left Hermione first started the base for Amortentia, before starting the Blood-Replenishing Potion, the Blemish Blitzer and the Burn Healing Paste and Burning Bitter Root Balm. Once all potions where stabilized she began the process of cataloging what all had been added to their stores and making a list of what they would need to purchase more of.

It took the entire brewing time to catalog her now massive store room and to see that really all they needed where more potions ingredients from the apothecary in Diagon Alley. After compiling a list and letting Athena take it to Dumbledore she returned to the potions she had been working on before started to let them cool and decant them as the boys where finishing up a generic healing ointment made of 4 drops Cedar Wood Oil, 2 drops Sandalwood Oil, 1 drop Eucalyptus Oil, and 1 drop Cinnamon Oil which they had multiplied by fifty at Hermione's instance.

True to his word Professor Dumbledore returned for dinner bringing with him several large bottles of Butterbeer as a gift for his hostess. Dinner itself was a usual affair, even if it felt weird to be eating dinner with the Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Once dinner was finished and the dishes had started washing themselves they retired to Hermione's office where Professor Dumbledore unshrunk four rather large, overly stuffed chairs before he began to tell them the reason he had come to them that evening.

"First, here is your supply list for Year Six and Year Seven. I know you Hermione, you'll want to get a head start. You actually have several book lists in here as well as your schedule as your schedule is somewhat unique to just the three of you." He said, handing them two different letters. "Ron, yours is the same as Harry's so I figured I could owl yours to your mother's so she would be pleased enough to see your Prefect's Badge." He said, noticing how Ron's eyes lit up at being told he was a Prefect. "Hermione's contains a Prefect's Badge and Harry's contains the Qudditch Captain Badge. Now back to your schedules. " He said, directing them to read them:

* * *

**Year Six Book & Supply List**

_Books_

_Care of Magical Creatures_

A Vampire's Monologue by Amarillo Lestoat

The Rise and Fall of the Vampire Era by Miranda Goshawk

Merpeople: A Comprehensive Guide to Their Language and Customs by Dylan Marwood  
The Monster Book of Monsters by Edwardus Lima (Review Only)

_Transfiguration & Charms _

The Standard Book of Spells, Year Six by Miranda Goshawk

Quintessence: A Quest

Transformation Through the Ages

Achievements in Charming (Revision Only)

A Guide to Advanced Transfiguration by Emeric Switch

Intermediate Transfiguration by Emeric Switch (Revision Only)

_Potions _

Advanced Potion-Making by Libatius Borage

_Defense Against the Dark Arts _

Confronting the Faceless

Guide to Advanced Occulumency by Maxwell Barnett

Jinxes for the Jinxed

The Dark Arts Outsmarted

Defense Against Dark Creatures

_Herbology & Potion_

One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phyllida Spore

Goshawk's Guide to Herbology by Miranda Goshawk

Flesh-Eating Trees of the World

Most Potent Potions

_Arithmancy_

Numerology and Grammatica

Advanced Arithmancy

Arithmancy Notes for the NEWT Student

20 Arithmancy Practice Tests for the Advanced Arithmancy Student

Advanced Magical Theory

Beginner's Arithmancy Theory Fall Term (September-December)

Intermediate Arithmancy Theory Winter (January-March)

Advanced Arithmancy Theory Summer Term (April –June)

_Ancient Runes_

Advanced Rune Translation

Spellman's Syllabri (revision and study aid)

Magical Hieroglyphs and Logograms (Study Aid only)

The Prose Edda

The Poetic Edda

_Astronomy _

_Feynman's Lost Lecture: The Motion of Planets Around the Sun  
Atlas of Galaxies. By Allen Sandage an d John Bedke _

**History of Magic**

_World Mythology, Volumes One thru Three  
British Mythology, Volumes One thru Three  
Celtic Mythology Volumes One thru Three  
Notable Magical Names of Our Times _

_Other Books  
_

_Alchemy _

_A Study into the Possibility of Reversing the Actual and Metaphysical Effects of Natural Death, with Particular Regard to the Reintegration of Essence and Matter by Bertrand de Pensées-Profondes_

_Astrology and Chemistry in Early Modern Europe_

_Hermes Collection_

_The Emerald Tablets of Heremes _

_The Socerer's Stone (ALL 4 Books with this title) _

_Alchemy, Ancient Art and Science by Argo Pyrites_

_Great Wizardries of the Twentieth Century _

_Important Modern Magical Discoveries _

_Healing _

_Common Magical Ailments and Afflictions_

_The Healer's Helpmate by H. Pollingtonious_

_Household Magic _

_One Minute Feasts - It's Magic!_

_Practical Household Magic by Zamira Gulch_

**Year Seven Book List**

**Divination **

_Broken Balls: When Fortunes Turn Foul_

_Death Omens: What to Do When You Know the Worst is Coming_

_The Dream Oracle by Inigo Imago_

_Omens, Oracles & the Goat by Bathilda Bagshot_

_The Oracle of Palombo by Bathilda Bagshot_

_Predicting the Unpredictable: Insulate Yourself Against Shocks_

_Unfogging the Future by Cassandra Vablatsky_

**Transfiguration**

Theories of TransSubstainal Transfiguration  
The Standard Book of Spells, Year One thru Seven

**Charms**

The Decline of Pagan Magic by Bathilda Bagshot

**Potions**

_Asiatic Anti-Venoms  
Most Potent Potions _

**Astronomy **

_The Five Ages of the Universe: Inside the Physics of Eternity _by Fred Adams and Greg Laughlin

**Care of Magical Creatures **

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newton Scamander

The Monster Book of Monsters

**History of Magic**

Great Wizardries of the Twentieth Century  
Natures Nobility: A Wizard's Genealogy  
The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts  
Prefects Who Gained Power, 22nd Edition

**1 **Spare Wand  
Six to Ten Regular Cauldrons  
Six Set of Glass ** and **Crystal Phials  
Astronomical Map Set Depicting Stars and Galaxies in Next Ten Years  
One Rat, Toad or Cat Apiece for Advanced Transfiguration Lessons  
2 Packs of NEWT-level Parchment (refers to amount)

* * *

Hermione looked at the book list before raising an eyebrow in Professor Dumbledore's direction.

"Like I said your schedule will not match that of other six or seventh year students. You will be taking History of Magic, Divination, Herbology and Potions Years Six and Seven as Independent Studies. Hermione if you take the Divination IOWL, which is the international version of the Ordinary Wizarding Levels you can pick and choose which types of Divination you are tested on such as Numerology, Cartomancy, things that actual interest you. If you chose to do so however, you'll need to have studied up on them by December to sit the IOWL so you can sit your INEWT in the last week of May. You will want to bring all of your books from previous years for this school year, as well as any of your apprenticeship books, they are good for reference material. Now have any of you ever heard of something called a Horcrux?" he asked, the seriousness of his tone not boding well with the teenagers before him. When they answered in the negative he sighed before beginning his explanation.

"A Horcrux is an object in which a Dark Witch or Wizard has hidden a part of their soul in. It enables them to come back to life should their main body be destroyed." He said, pulling his hand from beneath his robes to show a blackened, almost destroyed hand.

"This ring belonged to Marvolo Gaunt and was passed down to his grandson, Morfin Gaunt. Lord Voldemort killed Morfin to obtain the ring but was unable to locate it. Foolishly, I put the ring on, because the stone embedded in the ring is the Resurrection Stone, which enables us to see those that have passed on. It allows us to bring them back to life but at a horrible cost to them; they are inanimate corpses if you will. This ring was cursed and by my own stupidity I am now cursed. Professor Snape has managed to create a few potions that will contain the curse for now but I will be dead within a years' time." He said, giving the young group a look of pity at the sadness that was written on their faces. "I have lived my time; I am just saddened that I will not be able to destroy all of his horcrux's before my time I'm afraid. This is why I wanted you to learn Occulumency. This is why I want you to learn ritual magic and Aromatherapy as well as several other topics this coming year. I will teach you all I can in hopes of preparing you to hunt down the horcruxes. I do not know how many he created aside from this ring and Tom Riddle's diary, which has already been destroyed. It takes a very powerful object to destroy a Horcrux and I intend to use Gryffindor's Sword to destroy this one. Taking on this task will put you even more at risk of being a target for Lord Voldemort, but you are already high targets to the Ministry and his followers as well. You will finish your sixth year at Hogwarts but it is best if you try and attempt to finish both sixth and seventh year this coming year. By the end of this school year I will have passed on. Once I do it is up to the three of you to finish the hunt for the Horcruxes."

The trio sat in silence before Hermione took in a shaking breath and began to speak.

"What do we know about Horcruxes? Are there any books on them? Do we know how he chose the objects he turned into a Horcrux? " she asked, her mind going a thousand miles a minute trying to process the information that they had just received.

"Unfortunately, you know as much as I do at the moment. I have gathered all the possible memories I can about Tom from outside sources and I have made a copy of them for you to view. This is why I encouraged your herbology and potions project. The more you get done this coming year the less you'll have to do on the hunt for the Horcrux's. The aromatherapy will be helpful for healing as well as stress reduction. Once you start looking for them, it would be safest to go off the grid so the more you have done the better. You'll be able to shrink you greenhouse and take it with you as long as you can learn the warding spells needed to hide a tent and the greenhouse. This is why I gave you the time turner Hermione, speaking of which I have one for you as well Ron, Harry." He said, handing them two golden time turners which they placed around their necks gingerly. "Hermione knows the rules, you cannot let your past selves see you, as bad things happen to those who meddle with time. I will obtain a greenhouse for you at Hogwarts as well as a private brewing room which will be off your living quarters. If anyone asks why you have your own private room you will say you are working on Masteries and it is a benefit of that. I will also be leaving you with several tombs I was able to find on the Horcruxes so you may study up on them and from there it is a matter of figuring out what he would have turned into a Horcrux from his memories. You will need to practice your Legilimency on each other as well as keeping up your shields at all times. I wouldn't wander to far from the house without the Polyjuice Potion in place as well. If you have any questions feel free to owl be but respell the letters to be a jumbled mess. The password will be 'Horcrux'. I will leave you now to get back to work; use the time turner to your advantage children there will not be enough time to get everything done by the end of this school year without them."


	12. Chapter 12

**Carnival of Rust  
Chapter Twelve**

* * *

Authoress Note: I lose regular internet access on or around the 28th of this month. With that being the case when I have access to an internet access I'll update what I have done, which means you'll get **23 Chapters **between now and then which is **Fourteen Days **so that averages to two chapters a day.

* * *

That's just what I have written so far but there may be more than 23 Chapters between now and then.

* * *

They talked well into the night after Professor Dumbledore left, coming up with a viable study plan to help them get everything done that needed to be done. Hermione and Ron would work on the Aromatherapy coursework while Harry would brew the potions on his own from five am until eleven. After lunch they would start doing what needed to done in the greenhouse as a group which usually only took them two hours at the most. Once the greenhouse was finished for the day, Harry would return to any potions work that needed to be done for a few minutes before they started cataloging Tom Riddle's memories for only an hour. By three pm they would start working on their Legilimency until it was time for dinner at five. After dinner they would start looking through the mountain of books Professor Dumbledore left them on Horcruxes before going through the books he had ordered for them from outside the United Kingdom. While Ron started working on learning Ancient Runes or Arithmancy depending on what day of the week it was ,Hermione would be making lists of every sort, be it books that she pulled from the Appendixes of books they already had or a list of everything they could possibly need while on their Horcrux hunt or working on more potions. From there the time turner would be used and they would start all over again on their school work for a few hours.

Ron at first complained about having to learn Ancient Runes and Arithmancy, as if he had wanted to take the subjects he would have taken them in the beginning of his third year, until he noticed that Hermione was staying up later and later to work on translating some of the books Professor Dumbledore had sent them.

When both Harry and Hermione started using the time-turner Harry literally attempted to knock some sense into one of his best friends.

"She's running on four hours sleep a night, working forty hours off of those four hours of sleep. You will learn this, you will know it like the back of your hand or Godric help me I'll turn you into a ferret and leave you as one."

The pale shade Ron had turned told Harry that he had made his point clear and nor a complaint was heard from Ron again as he picked up a book entitled _Ancient Runes for Beginners _and began studying them in earnest for the first time since he had been given the book only looking up when Hermione set a cup of tea down in front of both him and Harry with a silent nod of the head as she turned back to her Arithmancy calculations she would need to get started on the tent like Professor Dumbledore had requested that she do.

Hours where poured into the learning of the Runic Languages. The Elder Futhark was the most common and the first that most people learned in the Ancient Runes class. The Younger Futhark, specifically the Danish and Swedish versions of the Younger Futhark where very similar in their visual appearances. In the same respect, they are different in their own rights which was confusing to someone who had just started studying a course entitled _The Study of Ancient Runes_.

The Futhorc on the other had had thirty-three runes for its alphabet and it was giving Ron a headache at the diversity one Runic Language was showing. Hours where spent pouring over the texts and translating from English to Runic, and from Runic back to English in an attempt to learn the Runic Languages before school started back up for them.

Hermione laughed as Ron broke a quill before turning back to them.

"It's best if you think of everything like pictures and all you have to do is reprogram your mind to recognize that, for example, a plus sign (+) equals the letter a, it doesn't in any of the runic alphabets but you get my point. It would be best to make flashcards and move on from there, learning them one by one instead of trying to learn them all in one day." She said, quickly duplicating her old flashcards from her Year Four Study of Ancient Runes course, as well as the basic flashcards from her Year Three Arithmancy course as well, which was a lot more complicated than just memorizing this symbol = ?.

When she attempted to get Ron started on the Ogham Language he proclaimed The Study of Ancient Runes stupid in as many was as they possibly could before they finally after the course of a few days started understanding the Ogham who's symbols kept looking to much like each other for anyone other than those that had studied it since their Third Year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Thankfully Arithmancy did much better in his eyes than The Study of Ancient Runes. Although it involved numbers it was consistent, such as 2 + 2 would _always _equal four. The same could not be said for Ancient Runes. If eihwaz was next to ehwaz you would get a slightly different meaning than if it was next to Sowulo.

With constant and consistent studying Hermione was hopeful that Ron would be caught up in both _The Study of Ancient Runes _as well as _Arithmancy _by October and at the rate he was studying, he just might be able to. Hermione convinced the boys to make an owl-order from _Flourish and Blotts, _which turned out to be a rather useful order as there where close to forty moleskin notebooks which where the size of their usual textbooks.

Once the moleskin notebooks came in Hermione distributed them out to the boys, twenty apiece saying that she would get her own when it was time for a Hogsmeade's visit as they had taken to sneaking out to Diagon Alley anytime they had a Hogsmeade visit, even if most of the prefects knew where they were there, _Scrolls and Tombs _just didn't have the selection that _Flourish and Blotts _did.

Hermione decided to order her own set of mole-skin notebooks instead of waiting for school to start back up , tripling the boys forty count order and putting in a one hundred and twenty piece order which made her quiet popular with the owner of _Flourish and Blotts _and when a 50-Galleon Gift Card came with her order the next day she immediately turned around and ordered twenty five more mole-skin notebooks; knowing it would do them well to have the manager and owner of the book store in their back pocket.


	13. Chapter 13

**Carnival of Rust  
Chapter Thirteen**

* * *

**The Novikov Self-Consistency Conjecture **comes from Wikipedia and my Physics Textbook.

* * *

They talked well into the night after Professor Dumbledore left, coming up with a viable study plan to help them get everything done that needed to be done. Hermione and Ron would work on the Aromatherapy coursework while Harry would brew the potions on his own from five am until eleven. After lunch they would start doing what needed to done in the greenhouse as a group which usually only took them two hours at the most. Once the greenhouse was finished for the day, Harry would return to any potions work that needed to be done for a few minutes before they started cataloging Tom Riddle's memories for only an hour. By three pm they would start working on their Legilimency until it was time for dinner at five. After dinner they would start looking through the mountain of books Professor Dumbledore left them on Horcruxes before going through the books he had ordered for them from outside the United Kingdom. While Ron started working on learning Ancient Runes or Arithmancy depending on what day of the week it was ,Hermione would be making lists of every sort, be it books that she pulled from the Appendixes of books they already had or a list of everything they could possibly need while on their Horcrux hunt or working on more potions. From there the time turner would be used and they would start all over again on their school work for a few hours.

Ron at first complained about having to learn Ancient Runes and Arithmancy, as if he had wanted to take the subjects he would have taken them in the beginning of his third year, until he noticed that Hermione was staying up later and later to work on translating some of the books Professor Dumbledore had sent them.

When both Harry and Hermione started using the time-turner Harry literally attempted to knock some sense into one of his best friends.

"She's running on four hours sleep a night, working forty hours off of those four hours of sleep. You will learn this, you will know it like the back of your hand or Godric help me I'll turn you into a ferret and leave you as one."

The pale shade Ron had turned told Harry that he had made his point clear and nor a complaint was heard from Ron again as he picked up a book entitled _Ancient Runes for Beginners _and began studying them in earnest for the first time since he had been given the book only looking up when Hermione set a cup of tea down in front of both him and Harry with a silent nod of the head as she turned back to her Arithmancy calculations she would need to get started on the tent like Professor Dumbledore had requested that she do.

Hours where poured into the learning of the Runic Languages. The Elder Futhark was the most common and the first that most people learned in the Ancient Runes class. The Younger Futhark, specifically the Danish and Swedish versions of the Younger Futhark where very similar in their visual appearances. In the same respect, they are different in their own rights which was confusing to someone who had just started studying a course entitled _The Study of Ancient Runes_.

The Futhorc on the other had had thirty-three runes for its alphabet and it was giving Ron a headache at the diversity one Runic Language was showing. Hours where spent pouring over the texts and translating from English to Runic, and from Runic back to English in an attempt to learn the Runic Languages before school started back up for them.

Hermione laughed as Ron broke a quill before turning back to them.

"It's best if you think of everything like pictures and all you have to do is reprogram your mind to recognize that, for example, a plus sign (+) equals the letter a, it doesn't in any of the runic alphabets but you get my point. It would be best to make flashcards and move on from there, learning them one by one instead of trying to learn them all in one day." She said, quickly duplicating her old flashcards from her Year Four Study of Ancient Runes course, as well as the basic flashcards from her Year Three Arithmancy course as well, which was a lot more complicated than just memorizing this symbol = ?.

When she attempted to get Ron started on the Ogham Language he proclaimed The Study of Ancient Runes stupid in as many was as they possibly could before they finally after the course of a few days started understanding the Ogham who's symbols kept looking to much like each other for anyone other than those that had studied it since their Third Year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Thankfully Arithmancy did much better in his eyes than The Study of Ancient Runes. Although it involved numbers it was consistent, such as 2 + 2 would _always _equal four. The same could not be said for Ancient Runes. If eihwaz was next to ehwaz you would get a slightly different meaning than if it was next to Sowulo.

With constant and consistent studying Hermione was hopeful that Ron would be caught up in both _The Study of Ancient Runes _as well as _Arithmancy _by October and at the rate he was studying, he just might be able to. Hermione convinced the boys to make an owl-order from _Flourish and Blotts, _which turned out to be a rather useful order as there where close to forty moleskin notebooks which where the size of their usual textbooks.

Once the moleskin notebooks came in Hermione distributed them out to the boys, twenty apiece saying that she would get her own when it was time for a Hogsmeade's visit as they had taken to sneaking out to Diagon Alley anytime they had a Hogsmeade visit, even if most of the prefects knew where they were there, _Scrolls and Tombs _just didn't have the selection that _Flourish and Blotts _did.

Hermione decided to order her own set of mole-skin notebooks instead of waiting for school to start back up , tripling the boys forty count order and putting in a one hundred and twenty piece order which made her quiet popular with the owner of _Flourish and Blotts _and when a 50-Galleon Gift Card came with her order the next day she immediately turned around and ordered twenty five more mole-skin notebooks; knowing it would do them well to have the manager and owner of the book store in their back pocket.

By the time Hermione's parents had returned from their trip to France most of the herbs in the greenhouse where ready to be harvested as where some of the magical plants they had started growing. They started before dawn most days, and began the process of cultivating and drying the herbs before adding them into giant glass jars that were added to the storeroom. From there Harry and Ron started on the ever growing list of ointments, tinctures, and lotions, quickly running through their supply of 140-proof alcohol that was needed to make the tinctures.

The further they got into the Aromatherapy work the more herbs and plants they started collecting and growing at an alarming rate to the dismay of Hermione's mother who asked was this really necessary and when Hermione explained it was for her Mastery project, not another word was said about how full the greenhouse, or Hermione's store room, had gotten.

The second Sunday in June, which had been granted off to Harry as Hermione had yet to start working on Sunday's, had them feeling the pressure of not having everything done as quickly as they would have liked. It was quickly decided that it was time to start attempting to use the time-turners they had been granted to their full usage.

They started their day at five am and where surprised to see Mrs. Granger sitting at the kitchen table with three strong cups of coffee waiting for them with copious amounts of sugar as well as a decent spread of breakfast foods.

"Professor Dumbledore told me about the time-turners, which is, I assume, why you all are up this early. If you don't mind, work on the greenhouse first and I'll go with you so you'll have an extra set of hands that way when you use your time-turners I'll be outside with all of you." She requested, not wanting to drive herself mad by seeing two of them in two different places at the same time.

It was quickly agreed upon that the option presented by Mrs. Granger was a very viable option and thankfully Hermione had purchased a second set of resizing Dragon Hide Gloves while she was in Diagon Alley getting supplies earlier in the summer.

The young teenagers attempted to work through lunch, not wanting to risk going back inside and being caught by themselves when they went back in time later in the evening, but Mrs. Granger just laughed before showing them a basket that they hadn't seen before sitting on one of the shelves that was filled to the brim with sandwiches, crisps, and four individual thermoses of tea.

After a very quick lunch they worked until five that evening creating sage bundles, white sage bundles, and lavender bundles as well as lying out a vast majority of herbs to dry for use within potions or healing. By the time Mr. Granger got home from work they had harvested everything within their greenhouse that was ready for harvest as well as planted new seeds to replace what they harvested.

Once dinner had been served and eaten for the evening the young trio went to the tri-rooms that belonged to Hermione before picking up the time-turners that where wrapped around their necks and spinning them several times before it felt like they had used a port-key but where left standing in the same spot they had moved from.

"Harry why don't you get started on several potions Ron and I will get started some more of the creations for Aromatherapy." Hermione said, as Harry started browsing the notes that Professor Slughorn had sent them and started prepping the ingredients for _The Draught of the Living Dead, Draught of Peace, Dreamless Sleep, _a _Drowsiness Draught, Essence of Dittany, Fatiguing Infusion, Felix Felicis, Fire Protection Potion, Flesh-Eating Slug Repelant _for the green house and finally a _Forgetfulness Potion_.

Once all the potions had been started and placed under a _Statis Charm_ for what would be the next two hours as most of them where quick brewing potions Harry entered the office and began looking for a book that had mentioned something about time-turners in it that he had heard Hermione mention recently that she had read.

Finding a book entitled _The Magic of Time-Travel _ written by none other than Rowena Ravenclaw he quickly found the chapter on time turners and began skimming through the book to refresh his memory of the topic.

It stated that time travel followed the rule of the _Novikov self-consistency principle_, otherwise known as the _Novikov self-consistency conjecture_.

The Magic of Time Travelby Rowena Ravenclaw  
25th Edition  
Chapter Six: The Novikov Self-Consistency Conjecture

_The Novikov consistency principle assumes certain conditions about what sort of time travel is possible. Specifically, it assumes either that there is only one timeline, or that any alternative timelines (such as those postulated by the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics) are not accessible._

_Given these assumptions, the constraint that time travel must not lead to inconsistent outcomes could be seen merely as a tautology, a self-evident truth that cannot possibly be false, because if you make the assumption that it is false this would lead to a logical paradox. However, the Novikov self-consistency principle is intended to go beyond just the statement that history must be consistent, making the additional nontrivial assumption that the universe obeys the same local laws of physics in situations involving time travel that it does in regions of space-time that lack closed time like curves._

Pleased that he had found hard facts to back up what Professor Dumbledore had said about not using the time-turners to change things unless it was absolutely necessary and to only use them to gain extra time to brew potions or to study, he turned his attention back to his potions room where he pulled his last five cauldrons out of storage, and that included both Ron and Hermione's only cauldrons, as he put together a Calming Draught, a Cough Potion, the Cure for Boils, a Hiccoughing potion and finally an Invigoration Draught.

Once they were placed under a _statis charm _Harry made his way over to where both Ron and Hermione were working away on the projects for their Aromatherapy course.

"What are you working on?" He asked, pulling one of the books they had been looking at towards her and beginning to thumb through it.

"I'm making an Air Incense at the moment and then plan on doing Earth, Fire, Water and Akasha when I finish it. Ron's working on Zodiac Incense, Aries, Capricorn things of that nature. If you want you can get started on the Ritual Incense. There's Ceremonial Magic Incense, Circle Incense, Clearing Incense, and Consecration Incense from what I've seen so far. Whoever finishes first however needs to start on the next set which would be the Courage Incense, the three Curse Breaker Incense, Crystal Purification Incense, and Divination Incense." Hermione said, quickly thumbing through the book she was working out of before going back to work on the Elemental Incense she was making as she ground the herbs into a fine powder before adding them to the jar.

Harry finished the ritual incense about the same time that Hermione finished the Elemental Incense so he offered to start on the next batch of incense if she wanted to get started on the Essential Oil blends that they needed to make for the course.

By the time it was time to stop for another lunch break Hermione had managed to finish half of the Essential Oil blends which held larger quantities than she should have probably made but she was trying to only have to do everything once, and just take their supplies with them in case they flat out had to make more.

"I still have thirty more to go but I managed to get half of it done in fifty minutes or so it shouldn't take that long." she said, washing her hands as the boys kept working on finishing up grinding herbs for incenses.

"This is our last one before we need a break. We'll take over on the essential oil for you so we know how to make it and you can move onto ointments; only do a third of what is needed this time. Ron and I will split what what's left so we are all doing an even number." Harry said, finally getting the hang of the Aromatherapy course.

The ointments where only sixteen in number in the first book they were working out of and Hermione found that she liked the process of making ointments which made her wonder if she would enjoy the candle making process even more. The process of melting the bees wax or shortening depending on what kind of ointment they needed to make took the longest but in the name of not having to re-melt the wax three times Hermione started on the ointments and quickly worked her way through all sixteen within the first book within an hour.

Her favorite ointment that she made was one called _Flying Ointment _and then _Hex Breaking Ointment. _ She found that most of what was in this book for ointments didn't have a practical usage as far helping them find the Horcrux's but they were on the syllabi and didn't take that long to make so she carefully labeled all the ointments and dated them before adding them to her ever growing Potions cupboards.

From there Hermione started in on making herb bath sachets which where a major part of the syllabus.

"I'm going to assume that any of the Herbal Bath's we make are all going to be for me? I doubt either of you would want to use an herbal bath." She said, laughing slightly to herself at Ron and Harry's affronted looks at the mention of them even _contemplating _using an herbal bath.

"Most definitely." Ron said, shaking his head in agreement as he continued working on the oil that was in front of him.

"With that being said I'll make the Herbal Baths, the Ritual Soaps, the Bath Salts, Powders, Body Powder, Bath Bomb, Massage Oil, and the Foot and Hand Baths. That leaves you guys with the Brews, Tinctures, Sachets, Air Fresheners, Aroma Lamps, Closet and Drawer Sachets, Steam Inhalations, Mist Sprays, Laundry Scents, Carpet Fresheners and Potpourri. Your list is slightly longer but there are two of you so it shouldn't be that bad." She said, laughing as Ron's eyes widened slightly at the list.

"We don't have to do it all in one day Ron. Just get as much as you can done today." She said, as she turned her attention to making the Sachets for the herbal baths. The _Anti-Hex Bath, _which consisted of 4 Parts Rosemary, 3 Parts Juniper, 2 Parts Bay and 1 Part Mugwort, seemed like it would be helpful for all of them so Hermione quickly threw together thirty of them in ten minutes before deciding it would be better to just go ahead and round it up to sixty, which would each give them twenty uses out of it if the need was raised. After that she pulled the recipe for the Beauty Bath, figuring that a little pampering throughout the Horcrux hunt wouldn't hurt anyone. From there she pulled together an Herbal Divination Blend for Ron and Harry, followed by an Herbal Healing Bath for all of them.

When they found themselves caught back up in present time they finished decanting the potions that where left there before quickly changing and getting a very long, deep slumber for the days to come.


End file.
